"This covenant will be called The Palestinian National Covenant (al-mithaq
al-watani al-filastini).
ARTICLE 1: Palestine is the homeland of the Palestinian Arab people and an
integral part of the great Arab homeland, and the people of Palestine is a
part of the Arab nation.
ARTICLE 2: Palestine with its boundaries that existed at the time of the
British mandate is an integral regional unit.
ARTICLE 3:The Palestinian Arab people possesses the legal right to its
homeland, and when the liberation of its homeland is completed it will
exercise self-determination solely according to its own will and choice.
ARTICLE 4: The Palestinian personality is an innate, persistent
characteristic that does not disappear, and it is transferred from fathers
to sons. The Zionist occupation, and the dispersal of the Palestinian Arab
people as a result of the disasters which came over it, do not deprive it
from its Palestinian personality and affiliation and do not nullify them.
ARTICLE 5: The Palestinians are the Arab citizens who were living
permanently in Palestine until 1947, whether they were expelled from there
or remained. Whoever is born to a Palestinian Arab father after this date,
within Palestine or outside it, is a Palestinian.
ARTICLE 6: Jews who were living permanently in Palestine until the
beginning of the Zionist invasion will be considered Palestinians. [For the
dating of the Zionist invasion, considered to have begun in 1917].
ARTICLE 7: The Palestinian affiliation and the material, Spiritual and
historical tie with Palestine are permanent realities. The upbringing of
the Palestinian individual in an Arab and revolutionary fashion, the
undertaking of all means of forging consciousness and training the
Palestinian, in order to acquaint him profoundly with his homeland
spiritually and materially, and preparing him for the conflict and the
armed struggle, as well as for the sacrifice of his property and his life
to restore his homeland, until the liberation of all this is a national duty.
ARTICLE 8: The phase in which the people of Palestine is living is that of
national (watani) struggle for the liberation of Palestine. Therefore the
contradictions among the Palestinian national forces are of secondary order
which must be suspended in the interest of the fundamental contradiction
between Zionism and colonialism on the one side and the Palestinian Arab
people on the other. On this basis, the Palestinian masses, whether in the
homeland or in places of exile (mahajir), organisations and individuals,
comprise one national front which acts to restore Palestine and liberate it
through armed struggle.
ARTICLE 9: Armed struggle is the only way to liberate Palestine and is
therefore a strategy and not tactics. The Palestinian Arab people affirms
its absolute resolution and abiding determination to pursue the armed
struggle and to march forward towards the armed popular revolution, to
liberate its homeland and return to it [to maintain] its right to a natural
life in it, and to exercise its right of self-determination in it and
sovereignty over it.
ARTICLE 10: Fedayeen action forms the nucleus of the popular Palestinian
war of liberation. This demands its promotion, extension and protection,
and the mobilisation of all the masses and scientific capacities of the
Palestinians, their organisation and involvement in the armed Palestinian
revolution and cohesion in the national (watani) struggle among the various
groups of the people of Palestine, and between them and the Arab masses, to
guarantee the continuation of the revolution, its advancement and victory.
ARTICLE 11: The Palestinians will have three mottoes: national (wataniyya)
unity, national (qawmiyya) mobilisation and liberation.
ARTICLE 12: The Palestinian Arab people believes in Arab unity. In order to
fulfil its role in realising this, it must preserve, in this phase of its
national (watani) struggle, its Palestinian personality and the
constituents thereof, increase consciousness of its existence and resists
any plan that tends to disintegrate or weaken it.
ARTICLE 13: Arab unity and the liberation of Palestine are two
complementary aims. Each one paves the way for the realisation of the
other. Arab unity leads to the liberation of Palestine and the liberation
of Palestine leads to Arab unity. Working for both goes hand in hand.
ARTICLE 14: The destiny of the Arab nation, indeed the very Arab existence,
depends on the destiny of the Palestine issue. The endeavour and effort of
the Arab nation to liberate Palestine follows from this connection. The
people of Palestine assumes its vanguard role in realising this sacred
national (qawmi) aim.
ARTICLE 15: The liberation of Palestine, from the Arab viewpoint, is a
national (qawmi) duty to repulse the Zionist, Imperialist invasion from the
great Arab homeland and to purge the Zionist presence from Palestine. Its
full responsibility falls upon the Arab nation, peoples and governments,
with the Palestinian Arab people at their head. For this purpose, the Arab
nation must mobilise all its military, human, material and spiritual
capacities to participate actively with the Palestinian people in the
liberation of Palestine. They must, especially in the present stage of
armed Palestinian revolution, grant and offer the people of Palestine all
possible help and every material and human support, and afford it every
sure means and opportunity enabling it to continue to assume its vanguard's
role in pursuing its armed revolution until the liberation of its homeland.
ARTICLE 16: The liberation of Palestine, from a spiritual viewpoint, will
prepare an atmosphere of tranquillity and peace for the Holy Land in the
shade of which all the Holy Places will be safeguarded, and freedom of
worship and visitation to all will be guaranteed, without distinction or
discrimination of race, colour, language or religion. For this reason, the
people of Palestine looks to the support of all the spiritual forces in the
world.
ARTICLE 17: The liberation of Palestine, from a human viewpoint will
restore to the Palestinian man his dignity, glory and freedom. For this,
the Palestinian Arab people looks to the support of those in the world who
believe in the dignity and freedom of man.
ARTICLE 18: The liberation of Palestine, from an international viewpoint,
is a defensive act necessitated by the requirements of self-defence. For
this reason the Arab people of Palestine, desiring to befriend all peoples,
looks to the support of the states which love freedom, justice and peace in
restoring the legal situation to Palestine, establishing security and peace
in its territory, and enabling its people to exercise national (wataniyya)
sovereignty and national (qawmiyya) freedom.
ARTICLE 19: The partition of Palestine in 1947 and the establishment of
Israel is fundamentally null and void, whatever time has elapsed, because
it was contrary to the wish of the people of Palestine and its natural
right to its homeland, and contradicts the principles embodied in the
Charter of the UN, the first of which is the right of self determination.
ARTICLE 20: The Balfour Declaration, the Mandate document, and what has
been based upon them are considered null and void. The claim of a
historical or spiritual tie between Jews and Palestine does not tally with
historical realities nor with the constituents of statehood in their true
sense. Judaism, in its character as a religion of revelation, is not a
nationality with an independent existence. Likewise, the Jews are not one
people with an independent personality. They are rather citizens of the
states to which they belong.
ARTICLE 21: The Palestinian Arab people, in expressing itself through the
armed Palestinian revolution, rejects every solution that is a substitute
for a complete liberation of Palestine, and rejects all plans that aim at
the settlement of the Palestine issue or its internationalisation.
ARTICLE 22: Zionism is a political movement organically related to world
Imperialism and hostile to all movements of liberation and progress in the
world. It is a racist and fanatical movement in its formation: aggressive,
expansionist and colonialist in its aims; and fascist and Nazi in its
means. Israel is the tool of the Zionist movement and a human and
geographical base for world Imperialism. It is a concentration and
jumping-off point for Imperialism in the heart of the Arab homeland, to
strike at the hopes of the Arab nation for liberation, unity and progress.
ARTICLE 23: The demands of security and peace and the requirements of truth
and justice oblige all states that preserve friendly relations among
peoples and maintain the loyalty of citizens to their homelands to consider
Zionism an illegitimate movement and to prohibit its existence and activity.
ARTICLE 24: The Palestinian Arab people believes in the principle of
justice, freedom, sovereignty, self-determination, human dignity and the
right of peoples to exercise them.
ARTICLE 25: To realise the aims of this covenant and its principles the
Palestine Liberation Organisation will undertake its full role in
liberating Palestine.
ARTICLE 26: The Palestine Liberation Organisation, which represents the
forces of the Palestinian revolution, is responsible for the movement of
the Palestinian Arab people in its struggle to restore its homeland,
liberate it, return to it and exercise the right of self-determination in
it. This responsibility extends to all military, political and financial
matters, and all else that the Palestinian issue requires in the Arab and
international spheres.
ARTICLE 27: The Palestine Liberation Organisation will cooperate with all
Arab states, each according to its capacities, and will maintain neutrality
in their mutual relations in the light of and on the basis of, the
requirements of the battle of liberation and will not interfere in the
internal affairs of any Arab State.
ARTICLE 28: The Palestinian Arab people insists upon the originality and
independence of its national (wataniyya) revolution and rejects every
manner of interference, guardianship and subordination.
ARTICLE 29: The Palestinian Arab people possesses the prior and original
right in liberating and restoring its homeland and will define its position
with reference to all states and powers on the basis of their positions
with reference to the issue [of Palestine] and the extent of their support
for [the Palestinian Arab people] in its revolution to realise its aims.
ARTICLE 30: The fighters and bearers of arms in the battle of liberation
are the nucleus of the popular army, which will be the protection arm of
the gains of the Palestinian Arab people.
ARTICLE 31: This organisation shall have a flag, oath and anthem, all of
which will be determined in accordance with a special system.
ARTICLE 32: To this covenant is attached a law known as the fundamental law
of the Palestine Liberation Organisation, in which is determined the manner
of the organisation's formation, its committees, institutions, the special
function of every one of them and all the requisite duties associated with
them in accordance with this covenant.
ARTICLE 33: This covenant cannot be amended except by a two-thirds majority
of all the members of the National Assembly of the Palestine Liberation
Organisation in a special session called for this purpose.