The girl who declared the State of Palestine from Bus

From 30 years ago in March 1978 the independent State of Palestine was declared, it was declared by daring young girl in an Israeli bus. The story of that girl that starts in 1958 when Dalal Al Magrabhi was born in one of the refugees camps in Beirut for a Palestinian family from Jaffa. She completed her primary and secondary education in the Haifa school following the UNHCR , during that time she joined the PLO without the knowledge of her parents. She was a young nurse who no one ever thought that she would have another secret dangerous life as a commando commander including her parents.Al Magrabhi was known for her bravery and her revolutionary spirit. She was trained in PLO to fight and carry guns just like men.

In 1978 the PLO was suffering from different losses, Mossad was targeting its men and its camps in Lebanon were under fire. One specific operation made the PLO leaders search for powerful revenge operation that would rock Israel.

Operation Kamal Odwon

It turned out that earlier that year three important PLO leaders were assassinated by an Israeli death squad whose one of the members disguised as a woman to make it work, this member was not anyone except Ehud Barak; the future prime minister of Israel. {I can’t imagine how he looked like in woman’s dress; already he was not the first one in this conflict to do so from both teams}

Some said because of this operation Khalil Al-Wizer aka Abu Jihad planned for revenge operation in which he wanted to rock Israel and because of what Ehud Barak had did ,Abu Jihad chose a woman to lead the operation. He even chose the name of “Kamal Odwon” to be the code name of that operation, “Odwon” was among one of the three leaders killed earlier by Barak’s squad. “His image is above”

For the first time in the history of the PLO a woman led men in to a military operation against Israel. And that woman was not anyone except our Dalal Al Magrabhi who did not complete her 20^th year yet. In fact she was not the only one who did not cross her 20s yet, the rest of group was even younger than her.

Deir Yassin group

She was leading 13 young men, the oldest one of them was 19 year old and the youngest one was 15 years old.The Israeli sources say that they were 12 including her. Already 2 commandos were drowned in the way to Tel Aviv in the sea.The group included a Lebanese and a Yemeni. The group was called “The Deir Yassin group” tribute to the sad massacre of Deir Yassin village led by the Israeli terrorist gangs, already many of the operations and groups of the PLO called themselves the names of villages which saw massacres in 1948 and 1949 to remind the people of their cause.” The choice of ages can be controversial, it could a message that the bravery of the Palestinian young people who got this enthusiasm and passion to defend their beliefs, still it is bad because such operations need experience; you put too much responsibilities on them. The complete names and photos are below “

The gender of Dalal was not an obstacle for the Arab girl during that time, she was known for leading personality and bravery. Already Dalal was the leader and the political delegate to negotiate with the enemy when it is required. Surely she had the qualifications to be chosen for this role.

Behind the enemy lines

The operation was a daring one, the daring Palestinian rebels intend to sneak in small boats to the coast of Tel Aviv at night, then they would kidnap a bus full of passengers in order to exchange them with PLO POWs in the Israeli Jails. It was not only a hostage operation only because part of the plan the group would take the hostages bus to the Israeli Knesset at Tel Aviv to negotiate officially with the State of Israel “Before transferring the Knesset to Jerusalem”. As you can see it was not a behind the enemy lines operation, it meant to send an important message during that time not only to Israel but the whole world. The Whole world will watch these 14 commandos.

Before the day before the operation Dalal went to farewell her mother bringing to the house a painting of her portrait telling her that she was going to spend some days with her friends, the mother felt there was something wrong, she wanted her child not her portrait but Dalal went away leaving her mother afraid, the Palestinian woman knew that her daughter was too close from death but could not say. She knew it after 3 days.

The date was the 11^th of March; the Deir Yassin group rented a commercial ship from Beirut to leave them 12 miles away from Tel Aviv, where they reached it in small black rubber boats. The weather was bad and they had to lose members as I mentioned earlier .They arrived to some beach near Haifa ; you must put in your mind during that time the Israelis did not think for one chance that the Palestinians would do an operation like that inside Israel. There was a slight change in the plan due to a change in the location they deployed to because of the wind during that night. Still Dalal managed to keep things under her control. They managed to get from the beach to the coastal highway a.k.a Highway 2 . According to the Israeli version of the story that night they killed an unfortunate American Israeli photographer standing on the beach and hijacked a taxi in their way killing its passengers, of course I wonder what kind of a taxi that would take 12 persons!!

They found what they wanted in the highway 2 , a bus near the Ma’agan Michael Kibbutz, on its board there were 30 passengers. Those passengers were the drivers of the Egged bus Cooperation and their families who were on a day outing. In their way to Tel Aviv they found another bus. They hijacked it too and transferred its passengers to the first bus. The total hostages were 64 passengers, who were surprised, shocked and afraid to see PLO group taking them as hostages. Dalal as a leading personality spoke to them but she found out that all of them except one ; a girl from a Moroccan origin did not understand Arabic; and so the Israeli- Moroccan girl translated what Dalal had said according to the Arabic version of the story

We are not going to kill you; we are taking you as hostages to free our brothers from your so-called country’s prisons. We are people who are demanding its right of its land. What brought you to our land?? You all should know that Palestine will always be Arabic and it will always regardless of how high your voices and your buildings are.

The Israeli forces knew during that time about the hijacking and they decided to deal with it in one way: No Negotiations what ever the price is.

They put security barriers, about three of them in the highway 2 which Dalal and her group crossed all. They were so near from Tel Aviv when things got to change, a special unit from the IDF began to pursue the bus, that unit was head by no other man except Ehud Barak who had and believed that there was a single rule in that situation : No Negotiations what ever the Price is

The Armored military vehicles began to pursue the bus in order to make it stop; they managed to hit the tires of the bus forcing it to stop near Herzilya . There was an unequal battle started. Already Dalal through her Israeli/Moroccan translator called for negotiations through the window of the bus, but Barak would not negotiate with vandals. The fires started from the Israeli side on the bus regardless of the Israeli passengers on board. In return Dalal and her group opened their fire on the Israeli troops. Dalal was injured but continued to fight still she was seriously injured again

Dalal and her group fought till the end, till 11 of them including Dalal fall but not alone ; with them there were 35 civilians in the Bus also, beside 30 IDF soldiers according to the IDF statements. The Israeli version is saying that Dalal and her group started to kill the passengers and that they blew the bus in order to escape. Technically I do not know where they wanted to escape according to this version, it is just like Tarek Ibn Ziad’s famous quote “The Mountain is in front of you and the sea is behind, where is the escape??” May be they blew the bus because they did not caught but I highly doubted it because I read that some members pretended to give up fighting to come closer to the IDF troops so they could start fighting again. Unfortunately most of the Passengers that Dalal did not want to kill or hurt were killed; of course the Israeli version blames the Palestinian nurse and the Arabic version says that the IDF fires killed who ever was on the bus. Two things I know them 1) Dalal did not go to Israel to kill those people . 2) The passengers at least the women and children had a chance to live if Barak would have listened and started to negotiate.

Barak won and he conquered those vandals whom surprised him with their younger age but also about the identity of their leader. He asked one of her group injured member where their leader was and the injured member referred with his finger to a dead commando saying “Dalal”.

It was the first time to Barak to see a Palestinian woman commando leading a commando group like this. Barak’s international fame began then when the cameras recorded his golden moment slapping and kicking the dead body of Dalal to make a historical infamous shot.

The Israelis felt so humiliated, the PLO crossed all the lines that time, it was not like Munich, it is beyond the enemy’s line, for the first time the citizens of Israel see the children of Palestine and thus extreme measures should be done . The Litani operation was launched and new war saga between the PLO and the IDF started, but this time the IDF did not see the consequences well because in Lebanon they won new enemies even if they did not see that coming ,they should have known better.

One thing I have forgot to mention and it is related to the title of this piece, Dalal in that bus had announced the Palestinian State hanging its flag and singing its anthem which is based on our national Egyptian anthem but with slight change in lyrics. It was a short life state but still like What Nazir Qabbani said from 30 years ago, at least the Palestinian flag was raised on Palestine for the first time.

In her well by her own hand writing Dalal wanted to be buried in the land of Palestine, it seemed that she got what she wanted; at least for the last 30 years till her family asked Hezbollah to include her body in its POWs Negotiations that succeeded for couple of days.

Dalal was the first PLO woman to die in action like this since 1948. She was mourned by many in the Arab world till now. She inspired poems. Schools were named after her ,she became an icon with her two photos in the military uniform,in which I published here.

The Israelis and most of the West world consider her as a terrorist ,where as the Palestinians and most of the Arab World consider her a commando heroine; between the two views that won’t meet , the truth of that night will not be clear to us 100% , I write this and part of me understands the motive of Dalal and her company to do what they had done and another part of me is with those civilians who were victims of their government before the victims of Dalal and Co.

The Photos of the Deir Yassin group :

Sources:

• BBC Arabic article about Dalal. “Neutral”
• Farfahinne’s post about operation Kamal Odwon. “Arabic version of the story”
• The Remains of Dalal Al Magrabhi from Time Magazine “Neutral”
• Dalal Al Magrabhi’s page in Wikipedia “Israeli version of the story”
• The Coastal Road massacre “Israeli version of the story”
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