Abstract:
Around mid-November 2002, PLO Executive Committee secretary Mahmud Abbas (Abu Mazin), who is often named as a possible successor to Yasir Arafat, delivered a controversial speech to a closed meeting of the heads of the popular committees of the Gaza Strip refugee camps in which he criticized the course taken by the al-Aqsa intifada and called for abandonment of the armed struggle. The transcript of Abbas’s speech was published by al-Hayat on 26 November, enlivening public debate as to what the Palestinian strategy should be (for another perspective see the Azmi Bishara piece in this issue). The excerpts below were translated and published by Mideast Mirror on 27 November.