by the Palestinian National Council

“ Our hearts are lifted up and irradiated by the light emanating from the much blessed intifada, from those who have endured and have fought the fight of the camps, of dispersion, of exile, from those who have borne the standard for freedom, our children, our aged, our youth, our prisoners, detainees and wounded, all those ties to our sacred soil are confirmed in camp, village, and town. ”

“ For what has been the unbroken chain of our people’s rebellions but the heroic embodiment of our will for national independence. And so the people was sustained in the struggle to stay and to prevail. ”

“ The ingenuity of our people has always throughout these trying times been ready to invent ways and means of battle which enhance its defiance and resistance, its ability to confront the crimes and practices of the enemy and, consequently, to continue its heroic and determined struggle.
By means of its defiance, the continuation of its revolution and the escalation of its uprising, our people has proved its determination to continue the struggle, whatever the sacrifices, to the utmost limits. ”

“ To call on free and noble men throughout the world to stand by our masses, our revolution and our uprising in opposing the Israeli occupation, its methods of repression and organized official military Fascist terrorism, as practised by the forces of the occupation army, armed individuals and fanatic settlers against our masses, our universities, our schools, our institutions, our national economy and our Islamic and Christian holy places. ”

“ O God, Master of the Kingdom, Thou givest the Kingdom to whom Thou wilt, and seizes the Kingdom from whom Thou wilt, Thou exalted whom Thou wilt, and Thou abasest whom Thou wilt; in Thy hand is the good ”

“ And behold how these generations, the sons of the Palestine Liberation Organization, affirm the vitality and continuity of that revolution and make the ground explode beneath the feet of the occupiers, proving that the battle reserves of our people are not depleted and that its deep faith is firm and profound. ”

“ It has also been affirmed that our people's struggle is the decisive factor in ensuring that our national rights are wrested from the claws of the occupation and that it is the authority of the popular masses, as represented by their committees, which controls the situation and confronts the occupation authority and its crumbling apparatus. ”

“ Behold the generations which have been bred on the purposes and principles of the Palestinian revolution and have lived through all its battles since its awakening in 1965, experiencing the heroic defiance of the Zionist invasion in 1982 and the resistance of the camps of the revolution in Lebanon against the siege of starvation and death. ”

“ The rights of minorities will duly be respected by the majority, as minorities must abide by decisions of the majority. Governance will be based on principles of social justice, equality and non-discrimination in public rights of men or women, on grounds of race, religion, color or sex, and the aegis of a constitution which ensures the rule of law and an independent judiciary. Thus shall these principles allow no departure from Palestine’s age-old spiritual and civilizational heritage of tolerance and religious coexistence. ”

“ By stages, the occupation of Palestine and parts of other Arab territories by Israeli forces, the willed dispossession and expulsion from their ancestral homes of the majority of Palestine’s civilian inhabitants, was achieved by organized terror; those Palestinians who remained, as a vestige subjugated in its homeland, were persecuted and forced to endure the destruction of their national life. ”

“ The inhuman and abhorrent crimes and practices of the occupation have given the lie to the Zionist propaganda about democracy in the Zionist entity, which has deceived international public opinion for 40 years. The true face of Israel has been made apparent: a colonialist, racist, Fascist State based on the seizure of Palestinian land, extermination of the Palestinian people and, in addition, threats, aggression and expansionism in neighbouring Arab territories. ”

“ Apart from those Israeli democratic and progressive forces which have rejected the occupation, condemned it, and deplored its oppressive practices and measures, Jewish groups throughout the world are no longer able to continue defending Israel or to remain silent about its crimes against the Palestinian people. Many voices have been raised within these groups in calls for an end to such crimes and for Israel's withdrawal from the occupied territories, in order to enable the Palestinian people to exercise its right to self-determination. ”

“ The Palestine National Council renews its commitment to United Nations resolutions affirming the right of peoples to resist foreign occupation, colonialism and racial discrimination, and their right to struggle for their independence. ”

“ It will join with all states and peoples in order to assure a permanent peace based upon justice and the respect of rights so that humanity’s potential for well-being may be assured, an earnest competition for excellence may be maintained, and in which confidence in the future will eliminate fear for those who are just and for whom justice is the only recourse. ”

“ It calls upon all sectors of the United States population to work towards the adoption of policies which are consistent with international rules, conventions and resolutions on the subject of human rights and serve the desired purpose of bringing about peace in the Middle East and ensuring security for all its peoples, including the Palestinian people. ”

“ This has been shown by the rallying of the Palestinian masses in all their national institutions - including trade unions, vocational organizations, students, workers, farmers, women, businessmen, land owners, professionals and academics - to the intifadah, through the unified leadership of the uprising and through the popular committees which have been formed in all quarters of the cities and in the villages and camps. ”

“ In it will be safeguarded their political and religious convictions and their human dignity by means of a parliamentary democratic system of governance, itself based on freedom of expression and the freedom to form parties. ”