Basic Facts About the Palestine Program, Scarce 1970 Anti-Zionist PLO Flyer

PLO

Ephemera

Basic Facts About the Palestine Problem. Issued by the Palestine Liberation Organization's New York office, disseminating a sharply polemical critique of Israeli state formation and U.S. and UN complicity. Double-sided flyer measuring 10" x 8". A revealing Cold War-era artifact of anti-Zionist rhetoric from the PLO during its height as a revolutionary nationalist movement under the leadership of Yasser Arafat.

The flyer is titled in bold, all-caps: “Basic Facts About the Palestine Problem.” Its structure comprises twenty bullet-pointed claims, each introduced with the rhetorical phrase “DO YOU KNOW:". Early claims emphasize the imbalance of land ownership in Palestine prior to 1948: “THAT the Arabs of Palestine at that time owned 97 1/2% of the land while Jews (native Palestinians and recent immigrants together) owned only 2 1/2%...?” It denounces the UN's 1947 partition plan, asserting: “THAT... the Zionists owned no more than 6% of the total land area of Palestine?” and questions the legitimacy of the General Assembly’s vote: “THAT the 1947 recommendation... was outside the competence of the Assembly under the Charter of the United Nations?”​ Later sections criticize the militarization of Israel and its relations with neighboring Arab states: “THAT, since the General Armistice Agreements were signed in 1949, Israel has maintained an aggressive policy of waging military attacks across the Armistice Demarcation Lines...?” The PLO portrays Israel as a Western colonial outpost: “THAT Israel remained... a total stranger in the emerging world of Afro-Asia... refused admission to any inter-state conference of Asian, African, Afro-Asian, or Non-Aligned States?” The flyer also characterizes the Israeli state as practicing apartheid, claiming that more than 90% of Arabs in Israel live under martial law in “security zones” and “are denied equal opportunities for education” and “equal pay for equal work.”​

Published by the Palestine Liberation Organization, 801 Second Avenue, New York, New York 10017, this document reflects the group’s diplomatic activities during the 1970s when the PLO was seeking greater recognition at the United Nations and support from decolonizing states. It exemplifies the rhetorical and strategic effort to link the Palestinian struggle with broader anti-imperialist and anti-racist movements, especially in the Global South, and to contest Zionism as an extension of settler colonialism. As such, it serves not only as a political tract but as an artifact of the ideological polarization surrounding Middle East politics in the wake of the 1967 Six-Day War and preceding the 1973 October War. Scarce. Minor creasing and edgewear; very good.​.

Item #21744

Price: $225.00