PFLP — "Strategy for the Liberation of Palestine": Who Are Our Enemies? (1969)

Who, then, are our enemies? Political thinking behind any revolution commences by posing this question and replying to it. Admittedly, the masses of our Palestinian people have not yet answered this in a clear, specific and conclusive manner. Without a clear definition of the enemy, a clear view of the battle becomes impossible.

(1) Israel. In our battle for liberation we first face Israel as a political, military and economic entity which is trying to effect the maximum military mobilisation of its two and a half million nationals to defend its aggressive expansionist racial structure and prevent us from regaining our land, our freedom and our rights.

Our people today are no longer in need of new experiments and improvised actions. In our struggle for the liberation of Palestine, we face primarily world imperialism, our battle is directed basically against it, against Israel which acts as its base and against the reactionary forces which are allied to it. We will not win the battle unless we have a clear knowledge of our enemy to ensure that our calculations for the battle are correct.

In the light of all this the main features of the enemy facing us become clear: 1. Our enemy in the battle is Israel, Zionism, world imperialism and Arab reaction. 2. This enemy possesses technological superiority and definite superiority in production which naturally develops into military superiority and great fighting power. […] 4. The nature of the battle in relation to this enemy's principal military base represented by Israel is a life-or-death struggle which the political and military leadership inside Israel will endeavour to put up until the last breath.