"Galilee Freedom Batallions" and the 1974 PLO "phased plan"

The previously unknown group that claimed responsibility for the Mercaz HaRav massacre calls itself the "Galilee Freedom Battalions-the Martyrs of Imad Mughniyeh." Many people commented on the second half of their title, wondering if it was a front group for Hezbollah.

We should be more concerned about the first half.

In 1974, the PLO established the "phased plan" to destroy Israel. Even then, the goal was not an independent Palestinian state, but to destroy Israel in stages - to grab whatever territory it can by any means, using it as a platform to grab more - with an independent Palestinian Arab state just a temporary step on the way towards a pan-Arab state:

2. The Palestine Liberation Organization will employ all means, and first and foremost armed struggle, to liberate Palestinian territory and to establish the independent combatant national authority for the people over every part of Palestinian territory that is liberated. This will require further changes being effected in the balance of power in favor of our people and their struggle.

3. The Liberation Organization will struggle against any proposal for a Palestinian entity the price of which is recognition, peace, secure frontiers, renunciation of national rights, and the deprival of our people of their right to return and their right to self-determination on the soil of their homeland.

4. Any step taken towards liberation is a step towards the realization of the Liberation Organization’s strategy of establishing the democratic Palestinian State specified in the resolutions of the previous Palestinian National Councils.

8. Once it is established, the Palestinian national authority will strive to achieve a union of the confrontation countries, with the aim of completing the liberation of all Palestinian territory, and as a step along the road to comprehensive Arab unity.

And immediately after Arafat signed the Oslo Accords in 1993, he told a radio station that the accords

...will be a basis for an independent Palestinian state in accordance with the Palestine National Council resolution issued in 1974... The PNC resolution issued in 1974 calls for the establishment of a national authority on any part of Palestinian soil from which Israel withdraws or which is liberated.

Arafat habitually referred to the 1974 plan during Oslo. This is the basis for the "good cop, bad cop" routine we are seeing between Abbas and Hamas - one trying to grab territory by ostensibly peaceful means, one by war, both with the same ultimate goal that was codified in Cairo in 1974.

Seen in this context, it makes perfect sense that while the PLO now has all Western countries pressuring Israel to withdraw to the Green Line, that the next stage start to be prepared now.

Which brings us back to the "Galilee Freedom Batallions."

Since the Galilee has a large Arab population, it is the logical place to start the next stage of the Phased Plan. They will start agitating for the Galilee to be a part of Arab Palestine. It sounds absurd now but after a decade or so of inciting Galilee Arabs plus terror attacks together with left-wing Israelis who are scared to death of a perceived "demographic" threat it will seem much more reasonable in years to come.

This group just released a picture of the murderer in military fatigues, strengthening the claim that they really exist (according to Palestine Today, they claim to admire Hezbollah but not to be associated with it). The point, however, is not whether this group exists or not; it is that all of the terror groups and quasi-governmental bodies work for the same goal using the same methods outlined in 1974.