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Wadie Haddad | |
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وديع حداد | |
 Haddad in Syria,c. 1970 | |
| Born | 1927 |
| Died | 28 March 1978(1978-03-28) (aged 50–51) |
| Nationality | Palestinian |
| Other names | Abu Hani |
| Alma mater | American University of Beirut |
| Years active | 1951–1978 |
| Organization | PFLP–EO |
Wadie Haddad (Arabic:وديع حداد; 1927 – 28 March 1978), also known by thekunyaAbu Hani (أبو هاني), was a Palestinian militant and leading figure of thePopular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP). He organized several hijackings of international civilian passenger aircraft in the 1960s and 1970s,[1] the most infamous of which was theEntebbe hijacking, when Palestinian and German militants under his command held 106 hostages – primarilyIsraeliJews, although four non-Israeli Jews were also held captive[2][3] – on a flight from Israel to France after diverting it toEntebbe, Uganda.
Haddad was born into a family ofPalestinian Christians (Greek Orthodox) in the city ofSafed in 1927.[4][5] His home was destroyed during the1948 Arab–Israeli War, prompting him to flee toLebanon as aPalestinian refugee. He received a degree in medicine from theAmerican University of Beirut,[5] where he met fellow Palestinian refugeeGeorge Habash, who was also a medical student. Together, they helped found theArab Nationalist Movement (ANM), a political organization ofpan-Arabists who sought to dismantleIsrael and unite the world'sArab countries.
After graduating, he relocated with Habash toAmman,Jordan, where they established a medical clinic. He worked with theUnited Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in 1956 but was arrested by Jordanian authorities in the following year due to his nationalist activities. In 1961, he managed to escape toSyria. From 1963 onwards, Haddad became a proponent of the armed struggle against Israel and succeeded in militarizing the ANM.
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After the 1967Six-Day War, the Palestinian wing of the ANM transformed into thePopular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), aMarxist formation, under the leadership ofHabash. Haddad became the leader of its military wing, involved in organizing attacks on Israeli targets. He argued for and organized hijackings, including the first PFLPaircraft hijacking in 1968, when an IsraeliEl Al plane was hijacked. despite criticism of the PFLP from within thePalestine Liberation Organization (PLO).
TheDawson's Field hijackings of 1970, when PFLP members includingLeila Khaled brought three passenger jets to Jordan, helped provoke the bloody fighting ofBlack September. After the expulsion of the PLO factions from Jordan, Haddad was subjected to harsh criticism from the PFLP, which was in turn under pressure from the rest of the PLO. Haddad was ordered not to attack targets outside Israel, but he continued operations under the name ofPopular Front for the Liberation of Palestine – External Operations (PFLP-EO). Haddad was expelled from the PFLP in 1973.
He also employed the services of Ilich Ramírez Sánchez, better known as "Carlos the Jackal", whom he had met in 1970 and trained in guerrilla warfare techniques but expelled Sánchez from his team after Sánchez had been accused of refusing to kill twohostages, and possibly stealing ransom money, following the1975 assault on theOPEC conference inVienna.
Haddad organized theEntebbe hijacking in June 1976.
During this time he was also friends with Swiss neo-Nazi,ODESSA facilitator, and formerAbwehr agent,Francois Genoud.[6]
Haddad died on 28 March 1978 inEast Germany, reportedly fromleukemia. According to the bookStriking Back, published byAaron J. Klein in 2006, Haddad was killed byMossad, which had sent thechocolate-loving HaddadBelgian chocolates coated with a slow-acting and undetectable poison which caused him to die several months later.[7]
According to the 2018 bookRise and Kill First: The Secret History of Israel's Targeted Assassinations byRonen Bergman, Mossad killed Haddad by poisoning histoothpaste. On 10 January 1978, a deep-cover Mossad agent with a high level of access to Haddad's home and office switched his regular tube of toothpaste for an identical tube containing a toxin that had been developed at theIsrael Institute for Biological Research. Some of the toxin penetrated the mucous membranes of his mouth and entered his bloodstream every time he brushed his teeth. Haddad became ill and was admitted to an Iraqi government hospital, where the doctors could not figure out what his condition was and suspected he had been poisoned. UponYasser Arafat's request, he was flown to East Germany to be hospitalized at a prestigious hospital which treated members of the intelligence and security communities, where he was admitted under the pseudonym of Ahmed Doukli. The tube of lethal toothpaste was included in a bag of toiletries his aides packed for him when he was taken to East Germany. He was extensively tested and the physicians suspected he had been poisoned with either rat poison or thallium, but found no direct evidence. His condition continued to deteriorate. According to intelligence provided by an Israeli agent in East Germany, Haddad's screams of pain were heard throughout the hospital and he had to be heavily dosed with tranquilizers and sedatives. Haddad died ten days after his arrival there.[8][9]
What remained of the PFLP-EO dissolved after his death, but in the process inaugurated the15 May Organization and thePFLP-SC.[citation needed]
According toVasili Mitrokhin, a seniorKGB archivist who defected to theUK in 1992, in early 1970 Haddad was recruited by the KGB as an agent, codenamed NATIONALIST. Thereafter, in deep secrecy the Soviets helped to fund and arm the PFLP. The KGB had warning of its major operations and almost certainly sanctioned the most significant, such as the September 1970 hijackings. Haddad remained a highly valued agent till his death in 1978.[10]
A letter by KGB chairmanYuri Andropov toLeonid Brezhnev, the Soviet leader and head of the Communist Party, about the covert transfer of arms to the PFLP refers to Haddad as a "trusted KGB intelligence agent".[11] The letter and two other highlyclassified documents from theCPSU Central Committee archive were located and secretly copied byVladimir Bukovsky in 1992.[12]
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