Fatah in Syria holds football tournament named after Arafat; Fatah official supports Syrian regime

Headline: “The Martyr Yasser Arafat Football Tournament in Syria concluded”

“The 5th Martyr Yasser Arafat Football Tournament concluded… at the field of the Jaramana refugee camp that is next to Damascus, the capital of Syria…

The tournament was held under the auspices of Fatah Movement Central Committee member [and Commissioner of Fatah Branches Abroad] Samir Al-Rifai…

Al-Rifai emphasized during the ceremony that the principles for which [former PLO Chairman and PA President] leader Yasser Arafat died as a Martyr must be adhered to: the state, Jerusalem, and the refugees. He also emphasized the importance of the historical connection between the Palestinian people and the Syrian people, and said that the goal is the same goal and the blood is the same blood…

Al-Rifai saluted all of the Martyrs of the Palestinian people and the Syrian people, which have sacrificed much and overcome terror, the plot of the rift, and foreign invasion.”

Yasser Arafat – Founder of Fatah and former chairman of the PLO and PA. During the 1960s, 70s and 80s Arafat was behind numerous terror attacks against Israelis. Although he received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1994 together with then Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and then Israeli Minister of Foreign Affairs Shimon Peres “for their efforts to create peace in the Middle East" after signing the Oslo Accords peace agreement, Arafat launched a 5-year terror campaign - the second Intifada (2000-2005) – in which more than 1,000 Israelis were murdered. Arafat died of an illness in 2004.