Leila Khaled: Hijacker Page #3

I cared about our goal,

not my appearance.

For example, Che Guevara was a womanizer.

He had one in every town.

I mean, were you something like that?

Wasn't your life more than

- the struggle for Palestine?

- Naturally.

I invited my friends home.

We cooked and ate together.

When my mother cooked a speciality,

I invited my friends home.

Specially those who missed their mothers.

Sometimes we went swimming.

In Sweden people sometimes ask me

why the Palestinian struggle is so serious.

There's no humor. No Jokes about

how we fled in 1948.

Why is it so?

Serious? There was a disaster

that happened to a people.

Massacres in Deir Yassin, Kibya and Tantura.

What is the Joke about that?

The Jews Joke about what

happened to them.

- So?

- Why can't we?

I wonder what's funny about it?

What's the point of jokes like that?

Today, Leila lives with her husband

and their two sons in Amman in Jordan.

Look into the camera.

Don't move.

That's it.

Thank you.

Her life is pretty restricted.

She can't travel as

freely as she wants.

And we were hardly allowed

to film her on the streets of Amman.

She works at the Palestinian

National Council office.

Her life is quite ordinary.

I'd like the large loaf.

Please take bread.

If you take your places and one of

us serves, we will have more room.

You didn't try the salad?

- Don't you like the salad?

- Sure! I'm eating.

- Take another skewer!

- No thanks, I'm fine.

- It's good!

- But I've had enough.

Had enough?

You've hardly eaten!

Have you already eaten

at your relative's?

What are your thoughts about 9/11?

I don't agree with the murder of civilians,

wherever it is in the world.

- Could you be described as a terrorist?

- Our enemies say so.

Our enemies call any form

of popular resistance terrorism.

What you did was an act of terrorism.

Who decides and defines

what terrorism is?

As far as I'm concerned,

occupation is terrorism.

My people and

I have a right to fight it.

I don't care what others call it.

People have a right to fight those who

occupy their country by all means

possible including weapons.

That's what it says in the UN declaration.

But Leila, if you look up "terrorist"

in a dictionary?

You, the whole of Sweden and Europe

and the USA can travel to Haifa.

But I can't, I'm not allowed to.

Not just me. 5 million Palestinians

can't see Palestine.

Israel doesn't care about international law.

Why should we accept that?

What have we done to deserve this?

We have suffered a lot.

Why is what I did wrong?

Isn't it our right to resist?

When we hi-Jacked the planes the

whole world wondered who we were.

Regardless of what they thought

about it, they wondered.

But when we were tortured in lsraeli

prisons, who heard our screams?

We had to do what we did in

order to get your attention.

Our people suffered in Justice.

No sound person accepts that!

No one.

The PFLP used children

in the struggle.

Yes, children came to the

camps for training.

They were there to learn

what we were doing.

We gave them schooling.

But is it right to use children

in the struggle?

Is it right that a child's mother is

killed in an lsraeli attack?

You mean you could send

your own children?

If that's what my children choose

to do, then they may do it.

What's the problem?

- So you have nothing against it?

- Not at all.

My children are not worth more

than other Palestinian children.

They have freedom of choice.

If we were living in Palestine, my children

would be demonstrating and throwing stones.

It would have been only natural.

But now they're here, not there.

They quite simply haven't had

the opportunity.

She takes me to Shatila.

A Palestinian refugee camp in Lebanon.

Leila says that this is where

the real Palestinians live.

Not in the Swedish, middle-class

suburb where I was brought up.

Open the window. I'm suffocating!

Open that one too.

I'm dying...

I can't stand this heat.

And now we're almost flying away...

Shatila is known for one thing only;

The massacre of 1982.

We love Palestine.

We fight, whatever the price.

The price is high,

but we must return to Palestine.

If not today,

then tomorrow or the next day.

I have always dreamt

of walking beside you.

You know Leila Khaled?

She is a terrorist.

They want to make propaganda against her

that she was a terrorist.

But really she is not a terrorist.

She is a freedom fighter.

- How are you?

- Fine thanks. And you?

- I heard your wife had passed away.

- Yes she did.

My condolences.

- How are you?

- Fine. And you?

I don't need a wheelchair.

I need two!

- How are things with you?

- Not so good.

Do you live here alone?

I wash, clean and cook myself.

- Where are your daughters?

- They've left home.

- Why are you crying?

- I thank God anyway.

- A home without a woman is the pits.

- Where are your children?

They're all with their wives.

The youngest is in Ukraine.

Poverty forced me to stop smoking.

You'll probably never stop.

The PFLP educated us and

we follow their policy...

I'm no longer

a member but it's still there...

- In your blood?

- In my blood and my circulation.

- If Leila stops, we stop too...

- No, I'll never stop.

I saw you on TV the other day and I

wanted to kiss the screen.

I'm proud of you.

- That's not a compliment.

- I know.

- We've known each other so long...

- I promise, Leila...

When they said you were going to

visit, I could hardly wait!

- What's it like out there?

- It's not easy. it's hard.

- God protect us. Do you believe in God?

- Sort of...

- Yes, we must say so, I guess.

- Tell me honestly.

- Where are you going?

- Fare well.

- I'll be back as soon as I can.

- Dearest Leila...

May your wife rest in peace

and may God give you strength.

Don't cry. We have cried far

too much. Stop it now, man!

I love you.

I say to all Europeans that you

too can return to Palestine.

You can pray with us in the Al Aqsa

mosque and make it a pilgrimage.

Now we're going to demonstrate.

God help us.

Let's go. After you.

Thank you very much.

I'll explain why the

plane was hi-jacked.

We had to; to get attention

so that the world

would understand our cause.

We weren't refugees who

were satisfied with aid.

It wasn't a natural disaster

that made us refugees.

We captured the planes to

ask the world a question.

Who are the Palestinians?

What did the passengers have to do

with the Palestinian cause?

True. The passengers had

nothing to do with it.

We tried to explain to them

that we had to do what we did.

And nobody was killed

during these hijackings.

We extended their flights and there

were times when they were scared.

Quite honestly, we apologized the

whole time, but said that we had to.

When I began work on this film,

I expected to find some remorse in Leila...

That the years would have

made her more circumspect.

But now I realise

that she regrets nothing.

Maybe I'm the one

with the problem.

That I, with my

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