It was Leila Khaled Hijacker, a relatively new documentary, and Leila Khaled herself - the “Che Guevara of the Palestinians” - was there for a post-screening discussion. She hijacked one plane in the late-60s, and attempted to hijack another in the early-70s, as a member of the secular Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), and was catapulted to fame, aided by her beauty and audacity. Today, she is revered as a hero by millions, especially in the pan-Arab world.
The object of her missions was publicity for the Palestinian cause, which until then, she says in the film, had gone largely ignored in the mainstream media. From that point of view, both operations were a success - unless you take the line, like the Swedish Palestinian filmmaker, that Khaled and her comrades gave the Palestinians a “bad reputation” through their acts. (No one was killed in the PFLP hijackings, the second round of which were coordinated across four filghts, Khaled’s being the only one that didn’t come off; planes were landed in friendly territory, then, after everyone had disembarked, spectacularly blown up.)
Leila Khaled and Dennis Davis
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