Palestine is a part of the Arab homeland.

The Palestinian people are an indivisible part of the Arab nations. The Palestinian people have been living in their homeland Palestine, from time immemorial....Since the dawn of Islam and up to the present, the Palestinian people have been the heart of the Arab and Islamic nation protecting the first Qiblah and the third holiest shrine [AlAqsa Mosque]....

The Zionist conquest came at the beginning of this century to uproot the Palestinian people, end their civilization, and implant a Zionist entity designed to carry out the imperialist schemes that seek to control the Arab homeland's resources and make this homeland a part of the colonialist's spheres of influence....

The Palestinian people have held out in the face of this Zionistcolonialist barbarism....The crime was consummated by the partition of Palestine and the establishment of the Zionist entity state in 1948.

Most of the Palestinian people were scattered outside their homeland and forced to live n exile in the diaspora....They were builders of civilization wherever they lived....

Then came the conspiracies hatched by the Syrian regime and carried out by its agent tools, including the dissension conspiracy, the double siege of Tripoli, and the war of siege and elimination against the sons of our people in the camps. The conspiracy sought to contain the Palestinian revolution and to end its effective role within the equation of the conflict.

The intifada has driven a deep crack in the barbarous Zionist entity, strongly attracted the world's attention to the justice of the cause, and imposed a new political reality that has great impact on all Palestinian, Arab, and international levels....

We convene the Fifth General Congress of our Fatah movement with more resolve and determination to continue the struggle with all possible means-political and military-to liberate our homeland and establish our state, the independent state of Palestine with holy Jerusalem as its capital...

The Fifth General Congress of [the] Fatah Movement specifies our future objectives as follows:

1. The Palestinian question is the core of the ArabZionist conflict.

2. Firm adherence to Palestinian Arab national inalienable rights in their homeland Palestine, including their right to repatriation, selfdetermination without foreign interference, and the establishment of their independent state with holy Jerusalem as its capital....

4. The Fifth Fatah General Congress affirms the historic importance of the resolutions of the 19th PNC session, particularly the documents of independence. The Congress supports the establishment of the independent state of Palestine and extends thanks to the Arab and friendly that have recognized it. The Congress authorizes the movement's central committee to work on all levels to implement the resolutions of establishing the Palestinian people's national inalienable rights, headed by the right to repatriation, selfdetermination, of the establishment of the state of Palestine on Palestinian soil with holy Jerusalem as its capital.

5. Continuing to intensify and escalate armed action and all forms of struggle liquidate the IsraelZionist occupation of our occupied Palestinian land and guaranteeing our people's rights to freedom and independence.

6. Bolstering national Palestinian unity on the various political and military levels, reiterating the PLO's leading role, and escalating the popular intifada aimed at ending the Zionist Israeli occupation....

9. ...rejects the Shamir plan on elections and affirms that any election in our occupied must take place n a free and democratic atmosphere under international supervision after the withdrawal of the Israeli forces

13. In light of the significant effect of the demographic factor on our conflict with the Zionist enemy, and in light of the huge efforts exerted by the Zionist movement to encourage Zionist immigration to Palestinian territory, the Congress has decided to set up an ad hoc committee within the revolutionary council to oppose the Zionist immigration to our homeland and to assume all cultural, information, and political tasks to prevent the arrival of Jewish immigrants in our occupied homeland....

The Fatah Congress calls on the Arab countries to abide by and implement all the resolutions and honor their financial commitments.

Respecting the right of the Palestinian revolution to perform its militant tasks through any Arab land....

Calling on the Arab countries, especially those on the confrontation lines, to unify their forces and mobilize their masses in order to confront the Israel aggression...

The Fifth General Congress...emphasized...the Palestinian people's national inalienable rights and the right of all oppressed peoples under occupation to use allforms of struggle for their liberation and national independence....

Sources: Excerpted from the political program of the Fatah Congress, August 1989

Fatah: Political Program