Dictionary of Terrorism

John Richard Thackrah

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2013
• eBook ISBN: 9781135165956
• Edition: 2
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: International Relations
• Index: Politics & International Relations

Terrorism is one of the primary concerns of the modern world and is increasingly becoming a major factor in all international relations in the 21st century. This revised and updated second edition of a major reference work in the area contains definitions and descriptions of all aspects of terrorism and political violence, including: * individual terrorists* terrorist organisations* terrorist incidents* countries affected by terrorism* types of terrorism* measures against terrorism* forms of political violence* history of terrorism* psychology of terrorism

A

Abu Nidal

b.1937; d. 2002

Sabri Khalil al Banna was born in Jaffa, in Palestine. His family later moved to the West Bank and he went to Egypt to study engineering and became involved with the revolutionary Ba’ath Party of Jordan in 1955. After the failed coup against King Hussein in 1957 al Banna found work in Saudi Arabia. He joined a Fatah cell and was expelled from the country in 1967. In 1969 by now calling himself Abu Nidal he was sent to Khartoum to open a Fatah office. In 1970 he was posted to Baghdad as the representative of the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) and built up links with Iraqi Intelligence. He broke from Yasser Arafat and in 1974 from al Fatah when its officials accused him of plotting to assassinate their leaders and sentenced him to death in his absence. In response, he formed the Fatah Revolutionary Council as the true force of leadership for the Palestinians. He built up the organisation with considerable Iraqi help. In 1980 he moved to Syria where he was mainly engaged in attacks on the PLO and Jordanian targets at Syria’s behest.

It was reported in June 1984 that Mr Sabri Khalil al Banna leader of the Revolutionary Council of Fatah (a Palestinian splinter organisation which was commonly referred to as the Abu Nidal Group after Mr al Banna’s code name), had left Damascus for Baghdad for treatment of a heart condition, and that the Group’s activities had been curtailed. Mr al Banna had been expelled from Baghdad in November 1983, and his readmission to Iraq was seen as being conditional on the cessation of the group’s operations. Al Banna was again expelled from Iraq in November 1984, and relocated the headquarters of the group in Damascus.

The Abu Nidal Group had claimed responsi-bility for the attempted assassination in June 1982 of Mr Shlomo Argov, the then Israeli Ambassador to the UK, and also for the assassination of the moderate Palestinian leader, Dr Issam Ali Sartawi, in April 1983. The Group had also been associated with terrorist activity in France and had recently supported the Syrian-backed rebellion by units of the PLO opposed to Yasser Arafat.

In almost simultaneous actions in December 1985 by Arab gunmen at the international airports of Rome and Vienna, 20 people were killed, including four of the seven gunmen involved. Responsibility for the incidents was widely attrib-uted to the Palestinian Abu Nidal Group, acting with the support of Libya. The four gunmen who participated in the Rome operation had statements on them signed by the ‘Palestinian Martyrs’; and the Arab Guerrilla Cells also claimed responsibility, stating that they, ‘hereby declare the birth of a revolutionary and suicide group’.

A day after the atrocity a telephone caller to a Spanish radio station claimed responsibility for the attacks on behalf of the ‘Abu Nidal Commando’. A US Presidential spokesman claimed all the evidence pointed to the Abu Nidal Group. On the same day, Israeli officials began to refer specifically to the Abu Nidal Group as the culprit. It had apparently erroneously been reported that he had died in late 1984. The PLO itself had consistently condemned the activities of the group, and in his absence Abu Nidal had been sentenced to death by the organisation. Unconfirmed reports from Arab diplomatic sources suggested that Abu Nidal might have been expelled from Syria to Libya following the June 1985 TWA Beirut Hijack, as part of a secret agreement between Syria and the USA. A week later Arafat claimed that the Syrian and Libyan Intelligence Services were sponsoring ter-rorism in an effort to discredit the PLO, and he described Abu Nidal as a ‘tool of Syrian and Libyan intelligence’. Israel tacitly acknowledged that the attacks were not the work of mainstream PLO but affirmed that militant breakaway factions such as the Abu Nidal group were ultimately part of the same movement.

A joint meeting of Italian and Austrian security officials held on 1 January 1986 reportedly concluded that all seven gunmen involved in the December attacks were members of the Abu Nidal Group and had been trained in Lebanon. One of the surviving gunmen had apparently confessed that the name ‘Palestinian Martyrs’ was a front for the Abu Nidal Group. It was subsequently reported that the gunmen had travelled to Europe via Damascus and Yugoslavia. The US Administration produced a Report on 2 January listing sixty incidents, which it claimed had involved the Abu Nidal Group over the past two years. The Report also asserted that the Libyan regime was actively supporting the Group, a claim which Colonel Gadaffi denied. On 5 January 1986 he refuted allegations that Libya provided training camps or assistance of any kind to Abu Nidal, who, he said, did not live in Libya, although he admitted having met with him during 1985. He added that as head of state he did not regard the airport attacks as ‘legal’, but said that it was the duty and strategy of Palestinian guerrillas ‘to liberate Palestine by all means’. At this time, due to a failure to locate any Abu Nidal power bases, the military option was not being seriously considered by US forces.

On 13 January 1986, an Abu Nidal newspaper published what it claimed was an interview with Abu Nidal, during which he admitted that his Group had carried out airport attacks, which he described as ‘absolutely legitimate’. He praised Gadaffi as an ‘honest man’, and claimed to have visited the USA several times using forged pass-ports, and to have recently undergone cosmetic surgery to avoid recognition.

On 20 January, the New York Times published an interview with Ahmed Jabril, leader of the radical PLO group, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine – General Command (PFLP-GC), which enjoyed close ties with Libya. Mr Jabril affirmed that the Abu Nidal Group was responsible for the airport attacks, and added that the Group received considerable material assistance from Iran where Abu Nidal himself spent most of his time. He claimed that the Group also received assistance from revolutionary organisations around the world as well as from conservative Arab states, and that it required relatively little money to carry out its activities.

A Rome Public Prosecutor issued an arrest warrant for Abu Nidal on 23 January 1986. By the early-1980s he had established ties with Colonel Gadaffi. Many of his men had installed themselves in camps in the Libyan Desert from where they continued their battle against Fatah. His efforts to regain control of the Fatah Revolutionary Council in 1987 precipitated a bloody internal feud that led to 50 deaths. In his later years Abu Nidal became paranoid and saw his organisation torn apart by infighting.

Rumours immediately emerged on his death in August 2002 that he had been murdered on the orders of Saddam Hussein for refusing to help in the training of al Qaeda fighters who had moved to Northern Iraq after fleeing Afghanistan. Saddam had also wanted Nidal to carry out attacks against the USA and its allies. Saddam’s Intelli-gence Chiefs ordered the assassination, which was carried out by Iraqi security forces. There is still an unsubstantiated claim that Abu Nidal was behind the Lockerbie aeroplane bombing. Abu Bakr, a former spokesman for Nidal’s Revolutionary Council said N idal had told him his Group was responsible for Lockerbie.

Many believe that Iraqi Intelligence did not kill Abu Nidal as he was their guest. Abu Nidal killed Yasser Arafat’s number two man in the PLO based in Tunis, Salah Khalaf, also known as Abu Iyad. It took time for Iyad’s supporters to exact their revenge, but this they did when they knew Nidal was in Baghdad seeking treatment for his cancer. Indeed, Abu Nidal’s family who live on the WestBank, were told that the assassination was the long-awaited revenge of the PLO for the death of Abu Iyad.

See also: Anti-Semitic Terrorism; PLO.

References

Melman, Y.(1987) The Master Terrorist: The True Story Behind Abu Nidal,London: Sidgwick & Jackson.

Miller, A.(1987) ‘Portrait of Abu Nidal’ in Laqueur,W.(ed.) The Terrorism Reader,New York: Meridian,pp. 309–314.

Seale, P.(1992) Abu Nidal: A Gun for Hire,New York:Random House.

Further Reading

Abu Nidal(1986) ‘The Palestinian Goal Justifies Terrorism’ in Szumski, B.(ed.) Terrorism: Opposing Viewpoints,St Paul, MN: Greenhaven Press, pp. 113–118.

Editorial (2002) ‘Who Killed Abu Nidal?’ Jane’s Foreign Report,no. 2702, pp 1–2.

UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office ‘Abu Nidal Group and State Terrorism’ in Alexander, Y.(ed.) (1987) The 1988 Annual on Terrorism,Dordrecht: Martinus Nijhoff, pp 283–297.

Achille Lauro Hijack

The Italian cruise liner Achille Lauro was hijacked on 7 October 1985 en route between the two Egyptian ports of Alexandria and Port Said by four Palestinian guerrillas who, it later transpired, were members of the Tunis-based faction of the Palestinian Liberation Front (PLF) – a constituent part of the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO). Under the hijacker’s directions, the ship with 180 passengers and 331 crew on board (approximately 600 passengers having disembarked at Alexandria) circled in the Eastern Mediterra-nean. During the period of the hijacking the guerrillas demanded the release of 50 Palestinian prisoners and threatened to kill the passengers. Only one of the passengers, a disabled Jewish American named Mr Klinghoffer, was murdered – he was shot and subsequently thrown overboard. After lengthy negotiations over two days with Egyptian and Italian officials and two PLO members including the PLF Leader Abul Abbas, the hijackers surrendered reportedly in return for free passage out of Egypt.

The identity and affiliations of those responsible for the Achille Lauro hijack remained unclear for some time. The Israelis believed the action was a deliberate attempt by Yasser Arafat and the PLO to prevent further progress towards peace negotia-tions. The operation was widely denounced in Arab and Palestinian circles, with both the mainstream PLO and the anti-Arafat Damascus-based groups condemning it. The hijackers themselves said they were members of the PLF, although Mr Arafat denied that members of any PLO group were involved, and the Damascus-based PLF under Talat Yacoub disclaimed responsibility. It was only after the surrender of the hijackers that it became clear that the operation had been mounted by the Tunis-based breakaway wing of the PLF, led by Abbas.

The PLF itself had originally been created by Yacoub as a breakaway from the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine – General Command (PFLP-GC) of Ahmed Jabril. Abbas had joined the PLF on its formation but had led a breakaway proArafat loyalist faction, which had subsequently based itself in Tunis when the main PLF had held its seventh congress in Tunis, and passed a resolution opposing the Arafat-Hussein reconcilia-tion. In Tunis, Abu Abbas promised that the PLF would continue the struggle, trying to achieve PLO unity and legitimate leadership.

After the hijacking was over, Abbas confirmed earlier reports that the hijackers had been under orders to use the liner only as a means of transport to the Israeli port of Ashdod (where it had been scheduled to call), and had not intended to take it over. They had been precipitated into the hijack when they were discovered in a cabin cleaning their weapons. A senior PLO official said that the guerrillas were under written orders from Abu Abbas to carry out a suicide mission in Israel and that they had changed their minds out of cowardice and decided to hijack the ship; thus the PLF would be punished for the action.

After Mr Klinghoffer’s death had been revealed President Mubarak of Egypt stated that the hijackers had left Egyptian territory, and were probably in the hands of the PLO. The PLO in Tunis denied that it was holding them, and said that they were still awaiting the arrival of the guerrillas, whom they intended to put on trial. President Reagan called on the PLO to hand over the hijackers to an appropriate sovereign state for trial.

On the night of 10 October, an Egyptian plane en route to Tunis with the hijackers, Abbas and a (unnamed) PLO official on board was intercepted by four American fighter planes and forced to land at a NATO base in Sicily, where the Palestinians were taken into custody by the Italian authorities. Abbas later flew to Rome. The Italian government refused an American request for the hijackers and for Abbas to be handed over to US authorities. This policy of appeasement of the terrorists caused dissent within the Italian government. On 12 October Abu Abbas flew to Yugoslavia, where the Yugoslavian authorities rejected a US request that he be arrested. The USA administration subse-quently publicly criticised the Italian decision to allow Abbas to leave the country.

The US action in intercepting the Egyptian aircraft was praised by Israel and the UK and criticised by many Arab states. It provoked further anti-American demonstrations throughout the Arab world. The trial of the hijackers, together with a Syrian alleged to be their accomplice, on charges of illegal possession of arms and explosives took place in Genoa; they were convicted and received sentences of between four and ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Full Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• Preface and Acknowledgements
• Introduction
• Abbreviations and Acronyms
• Conceptual Map
• Glossary
• Dictionary of Terrorism
• Films and Documentaries
• Websites
• Terrorism – A Historical Timeline
• Index