The Lemon Tree: An Arab, a Jew, and the Heart of the Middle East

by Sandy Tolan

The PFLP operations, moreover, provoked a massive Israeli crackdown. Thousands of Palestinians were jailed, including many who had no knowledge of any guerrilla operations. They were held indefinitely without charge. The PFLP tactics thus became a growing source of tension within the Palestinian nationalist movement, and in February 1969, the same month Bashir was arrested, a new faction broke off from the PFLP, soon to be called the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine. Abu Laila, one of the DFLP founders, believed the "lunatic actions" of the PFLP against civilians outside Israel had "smeared the legitimacy of the resistance." The DFLP leadership also objected to the rhetoric of "pushing the Jews into the sea" and began to see their struggle as against not Jews, but Zionism. They advocated for coexistence between Arabs and Jews within a single state, where no one would be forced to move.