‍  On 31 March 1982, as Israel was expanding the scope of its intervention in the Lebanese civil war and supporting the various Lebanese fascist armed factions, Yacov Barsimantov, the second secretary of Israel’s embassy in France, was shot dead by an unknown ‘woman in a white hat’. This act of resistance would later be claimed by the Lebanese Armed Revolutionary Factions – LARF, a Marxist, pro-Palestinian armed organization. Despite being sentenced in absentia, having an Interpol international arrest warrant issued against her, and being actively pursued by Israeli, American, French and Lebanese intelligence services, the woman who executed Barsimantov was never identified It was only when she peacefully passed away in Lebanon on 27 November 2016, that the LARF issued a statement celebrating the life of struggle led by Jacqueline Esber, or ‘Comrade Rima’, as she was called – the ‘woman in the white hat’ who executed Barsimantov and carried out several other armed operations against US and Israeli interests in the heart of the imperial core. On October 24, 1984, more than 2 years after the killing of Barsimantov, French police arrested Lebanese citizen Georges Abdallah in the city of Lyon. Although he was initially arrested on grounds of using fake ID documents, Georges Abdallah is still imprisoned in France, having been found complicit in the murder of Barsimantov and sentenced for his role in the LARF. Abdallah currently is Europe’s longest-serving political prisoner.

Today, after nearly 41 years, Georges Abdallah is the closest he has ever been to finally being released from prison. On 15 November 2024, the French 'Anti Terrorist Tribunal for the enforcement of Sentences’ (Tribunal d’application des peines antiterroriste – TAPAT) authorized the release of Georges Abdallah on the condition that he immediately leaves French soil upon release. However, that decision was later predictably appealed by the ‘French National Anti-Terrorist Prosecutor’s Office (Parquet National Antiterroriste – PNAT), and the French Court of Appeal is set to issue its final ruling on 20 February 2025, determining George’s fate. 

Since late December, the ‘Collectif unitaire pour la libération de Georges Ibrahim Abdallah – CUPLGIA’ has been fully mobilized to put pressure on the French State and its institutions for the release of ‘GIA’, on the basis that he is a political prisoner and that he has been kept in prison as a result, not of a judicial sentence, but of a political decision emanating from the highest echelons of the French State, as well as direct intervention from both the US and Israel. The CUPLGIA has also issued international calls to organize protests and sit-ins demanding the liberation of Europe’s oldest political prisoner.

This article will tell the story of Georges Ibrahim Abdallah, the Marxist resistance combatant who selflessly devoted his life and consciously gave up his freedom to champion the Palestinian cause. We will examine the factors that radicalized Abdallah and led him to engage in the struggle for the liberation of Palestine, and what his liberation would mean for the anti-imperialist left while also looking at his political thought. This article is based on letters written by Georges Abdallah himself, and on ‘L’affaire Georges Ibrahim Abdallah’, a book written by Algerian French Marxist Said Bouamama that AFMN is in the process of translating to English and Arabic.

Historical Context

Georges Ibrahim Abdallah was born on 2 April 1951 in the village of Qoubaiyat in Akkar, Lebanon’s northernmost and its most impoverished district. He was part of an Arab generation whose political consciousness was shaped up by the Naksa in 1967 – The Arab defeat in the unprovoked war launched by Israel against four Arab States with prior US approval. This defeat put an end to any hopes of the liberation of Palestine through conventional warfare waged by regular armies, and paved the way for the emergence of popular guerilla warfare inspired by the Vietnamese and Algerian models. This also allowed Palestinians to take back control of their own destinies, after the Palestinian cause had been monopolized by the Arab League and turned into a political bargaining chip. Abdallah engaged in political action soon after the Naksa, getting into political organising at the young age of 16. The Palestinian revolutionary factions moved their bases of operation to Lebanon in 1970 after the events of ‘Black September’ – the war launched against them by the Jordanian comprador monarchy. This made Lebanon and its capital Beirut the center of revolutionary political activity in the Arab world. But against increasing revolutionary activity in the country, the Lebanese bourgeoisie, backed by global imperialism and Zionist settler-colonialism, launched a violent assault to protect their class privileges. This onslaught targeted all progressive elements in the country, with the Palestinian revolutionary factions at its forefront, leading to the start of the Lebanese Civil War. 

Today, the civil war is widely misrepresented as a religious war between Christians and Muslims. This is the narrative presented by the reactionary forces who weaponize sectarian tensions to mobilize their followers. This was also shared by a small segment of the progressive forces, who mistakenly interpreted the class conflict in a sectarian and identitarian perspective, creating the notion of a ‘class-sect’. This notion was consistently rejected by Lebanese Marxists, such as the late Mahdi Amel. During these years, Georges Abdallah had immersed himself in studying revolutionary theory. By the early seventies, he had become a devout Marxist, using dialectical materialism as an analytical tool. 

Georges’ brother, Robert Abdallah, a Marxist academic and member of the Lebanese Communist Party, says:

  “Georges started his professional life as a teacher for the ministry of information in a very remote area in Lebanon, in the region of Akroum (Akkar district). This is where his class consciousness started to assert itself, particularly because of the huge poverty in this region. We can say that this region was lacking everything: no roads, no water, no electricity. The school itself was only made up of two rooms in a house. So, we can say that this experience was for him the starting point of his path of struggle.”

Through his political education and his lived experience, Abdallah, himself a Maronite Christian, was able to transcend sectarian and identitarian interpretations of the Lebanese war. His materialist analysis led him to conclude that global imperialism and its regional proxy, Zionist settler-colonialism, represents the primary contradiction to be fought. In 1971, he joined the ranks of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine – PFLP, the predominant Marxist-Leninist Palestinian faction. He took part in the fighting on multiple fronts and was even wounded in combat in southern Lebanon during Israel’s 1978 invasion of the country.

Mohamed Slimane, a Palestinian refugee from the camp of Nahr al Bared in northern Lebanon and member of the PFLP, described Abdallah’s time with the Front:

  “Comrade Georges Abdallah was an activist for the Palestinian cause. He lived with us in the camps, despite the difficult living conditions, while he could afford to live a comfortable life. But his beliefs made him live in the heart of the Palestinian problem. The PFLP would ask him to coordinate the work with other factions. He represented the PFLP inside the camps just as if he was a Palestinian.”

In 1981-82, as the Palestinian Liberation Organization – PLO, was in the process of reaching a US-brokered agreement to withdraw from Lebanon, Abdallah refused to give up armed struggle. Back in 1979, Georges Abdallah had co-founded, with other comrades, the Lebanese Armed Resistance Factions – LARF, with the goal of waging armed struggle from inside the imperialist core, embodying Wadie Haddad’s concept of being ‘Behind the Enemy Everywhere’. This willingness to wage the anti-imperialist struggle from inside the imperialist countries was reiterated by Abdallah himself in a statement during one of his trials:

  “Despite the suffering of all the peoples of the world, your leaders impose the peace and the legality of their criminal system, of which war constitutes an integral part; but you are wrong if you hope that war will never again go beyond the regions of the periphery.”

‍During the early 1980’s, the LARF successfully conducted 8 armed operations on European soil, mostly in France. The most important of which were the assassination of CIA asset and assistant military attaché at the US embassy in Paris, Charles R. Ray in January 1982, and the assassination of the second secretary of the Israeli embassy in Paris, who was also the head of the Mossad in France, Yacov Barsimantov in March that same year. These were followed by the failed assassination attempt of US Consul General to Strasbourg, France, Robert O. Homme, in March 1984. Georges Abdallah ended up being accused of complicity in all three operations, and  was widely portrayed as a ‘terrorist’ by the French State and French media outlets. In the April 3, 1982, in a statement issued by the LARF where they officially claiming responsibility for the assassination of Barsimantov, the faction sought to dismantle this ‘War on Terror’ narrative by saying:

  “Who are the terrorists? Those who kill a young person from the West Bank for resisting the occupation of their country by Israel, those who bomb the civilian populations in Southern Lebanon, those who blindly kill and yet dare to hide behind a supposed ‘ceasefire’…”

In his book, L’Affaire Georges Ibrahim Abdallah, Said Bouamama recontextualizes these events. He importantly reminds us that this willingness to carry armed struggle into imperialist countries was preceded by a period during which Israel and its intelligence services waged a purge on international PLO representatives, without any retribution from host countries. These waves of killings included the assassinations of the PLO representatives for Italy and France, Wael Zwaiter and Mahmoud Hamchari, in 1972, as well as the representative for Cyprus, Hussein Bachir Aboul Kheir in 1973, along with France-based PFLP leaders Basil Kubaissi, and Mohammad Boudia.

The Arrest of Georges Ibrahim Abdallah

In the summer of 1984, Georges Abdallah was placed under the surveillance of the ‘Direction de la Surveillance du Territoire’ – DST (Direction for the surveillance of the territory), the precursor of today’s ‘Direction Générale de la Sécurité Intérieure’ – DGSI (General Directorate for Internal Security). This started after the French Intelligence services were notified by Italian authorities of a man, who was arrested on the Italian-Yugoslavian border carrying 6kg of explosives. The man’s contact in Yugoslavia was revealed to be a Lebanese woman called Ferial Daher, who was based in France and had frequent correspondence with Abdallah.

Abdallah was eventually arrested on 24 October 1984 in the city of Lyon in Southern France, after presenting a fake Algerian passport, with the name of Abdelkader al Saadi. On raiding his house, French police found other fake ID documents and weapons. He was thus initially sentenced in 1984 to four-year imprisonment for possession of fake ID documents, conspiracy, and possession of arms and explosives. But what happened next was nothing short of a conspiracy jointly led by French authorities and major French and international media outlets to keep Abdallah in prison.

1. The Media Smear Campaign

Yves Bonnet, then director of the DST, describes Abdallah’s situation as follows:

  “In fact, when we arrest him, we do not know who he is. But when he was in police custody, he started issuing threats and proclaiming that he was a member of the PLO security service. Unluckily for him, I maintain friendly relations with Abou Iyad, the PLO’s second man and I also reached out to the Israelis on the other hand. At that point, we identified him as being the leader of the Lebanese Armed Revolutionary Factions, a pro-Palestinian marxist group, responsible of committing attacks and having killed three people in France. But we had nothing that could hold up against him. It was just a case of false ID, and possession of arms and explosives. (...) Until then, Georges Ibrahim Abdallah was accused of misdemeanors, he had no felony charges against him.”

As soon as Abdallah was arrested, major media outlets launched a systemic demonization campaign against him, turning him into France’s public enemy number one. Abdallah was quickly dubbed as a ‘terrorist’ and media campaigns focused on decontextualizing and depoliticizing his actions, painting them as morally inexcusable. It should also be said that there was unprecedented US interventionism in the French judicial apparatus. 

Jacques Attali, then counselor to French president François Mittérand, recounts when Ronald Reagan’s security advisor, John Pointdexter, sent Mittérand a telegraph days before Abdallah’s first hearing on 10 July 1986. In this telegraph, Pointdexter urged the French president to prevent Abdallah’s release prior to his trial, and reminded him that the United States will officially take part in the trial as plaintiff. US officials again breached French sovereignty on 11 July when the US embassy in France’s spokesman stated his “shock because of the ‘lightness’ of the sentence,”adding:

‍  “We hope that Abdallah - who does not hide his violent intentions vis-a-vis Americans and who is affiliated with a group which killed or tried to kill many US diplomats - will serve the totality of his sentence.”

‍In response, at his 23 February 1987 court hearing, Georges Abdallah refused to defend himself, opting instead to defend the cause he is struggling for, turning the hearing into a political platform to convey his position. By doing this, Abdallah recontextualizes his actions and asserts himself as a political prisoner, while also rejecting the legitimacy of the Court judging him:

  “For an Arab combatant to be judged by a special court in the West, it is absolutely normal. For him to be described as a criminal and a wrongdoer, there is nothing new in it. The ‘Bandits of the Aurès’, the ‘Terrorists of Palestine’ and the ‘Leprous Fanatics of Ansar and Khiam’ have all been subject to these honorable qualifiers. It reminds all those with short memories about the legacy of your Western justice as well as your Judeo-Christian civilization. But for the criminal Yankee, executioner of all dispossessed of the earth, to be on top of that, the representative of the so-called victims in front of you, then we might as well refrain from any comments on the nature of your court and the mission assigned to it.

How callous must the criminal Reagan’s representative be for him to proclaim himself as a victim and plaintiff in Paris while the US Navy is preparing for its onslaught against Beirut and other Arab cities? One has to have some kinship with Goebbels to be able to concoct this tragic spectacle! And who other than Western Imperialist forums to allow this spectacle to be a breeding ground for this dustbin of history and this disgraceful kinship.”

‍From a legal point of view, the proof of Abdallah's direct involvement in the assassinations was superficial at best. French authorities were only able to find Abdallah's fingerprints on a corrector fluid bottle inside the suitcase containing weapons. A newspaper dating to the day after George's arrest was also found in the suitcase, proving that at least some of the evidence was tampered with. 

French media did all it could to portray the Georges Abdallah affair as an effort in the struggle against Terrorism. It also occurred that during the years of 1985 to 1986, 13 bomb attacks had taken place in the streets of Paris, leaving tens of civilians dead and wounded. With increasing popular uproar and no leads to any apparent suspects, French authorities, with a concerted media effort, misleadingly attributed these attacks to the LARF and linked them to Georges Abdallah in order to manufacture consent for his continued imprisonment. These accusations were completely unfounded, and went against the LARF strategy of conducting targeted operations:

  “We attack those who organize the genocide of the Palestinian people. We preserve the lives of innocent people even if it is at the expense of our own safety.”  

These attacks would later be claimed by the ‘Committee for Solidarity with Arab and Middle Eastern Political Prisoners’ (CSPPA), a group linked to Iran, who were committing these attacks to reverse the French stance in support of the Iraqi invasion of Iran. The leader of the group, Tunisian Fouad Ali Saleh, was arrested in 1987. Even though the group had no links to Georges Abdallah or to the LARF, the damage had already been done. French Media outlets went as far as instigating totally unfounded conspiracy theories linking Georges Abdallah's brothers, Robert and Émile, to the attacks, even though they had not stepped foot in France for years at that point. Then-minister delegate attached to the French Minister of Justice, Robert Pandraud, later acknowledged the lack of any actual proof to convict Abdallah. Many years after Abdallah’s ruling was issued, Pandraud stated:

  “We had followed the LARF hypothesis (in regard to the series of the 13 bomb attacks that struck Paris) based on the first witness testimonies, even though we knew that for the French people who thought to have seen the Abdallah brothers on the sites of the attacks, all bearded near-easterners look alike. Our contacts, mainly Algerians, confirm to us that the Abdallah family has nothing to do with these attacks, but without ever giving us any evidence. I said to myself deep down that promoting the hypothesis attributing these attacks to the Abdallah brothers would do no harm, even if it did no good. In reality, we did not have any leads back then.”

‍The balance of power at the time, with the constant demonization campaigns and continuous political meddling including US interventionism made the outcome of the trial inevitable. On 28 February 1987, Georges Ibrahim Abdallah was sentenced to life in prison. This decision was unanimously applauded by all French media outlets as well as by French political parties, including far-right Neo-Nazi parties such as Jean-Marie le Pen's ‘Front National’ as well as the ‘Socialist Party’ led by Charles Hernu at the time. The French Communist Party was the only outlier, denouncing this charade for what it was, calling it ‘a parody of a trial’.

Even the US State Department officially declared its satisfaction regarding the ruling. Abdallah himself was well aware of the US pressure exerted on the French judicial apparatus to give him the maximum sentence. Abdallah denounced US interventionism as far back as in 1987:

  “I know very well that this stance (the right to resist) is to be criminalized, and it is in accordance with this task that you are called to order by the Reagan administration. In all ‘independence’ and ‘impartiality’, you have obeyed this call.”

‍2. Breaching a Prisoner Exchange Deal

On 24 March 1985, the LARF kidnapped Gilles Sidney Peyrolles, the director of the French Cultural Center in Tripoli, Northern Lebanon. By kidnapping Peyrolles, the LARF aimed to reach a prisoner exchange deal to liberate Georges Abdallah. Negotiations are quickly launched between the French and the LARF, with the Algerian State acting as a mediator. Although a deal was eventually reached for a prisoner swap, after the LARF released Peyrolles on the night between April 1st and 2nd as agreed, the French authorities breached their part of the deal. This came after a ‘fortuitous’ last-minute discovery made by French investigators of a safe house previously used by Georges Abdallah containing weapons, including a gun that was linked to the assassinations of Charles R. Ray and Yacov Barsimantov. This greatly aggravated the case of Abdallah who, until then, was only accused of misdemeanors. The news of this discovery was quickly leaked in the French press, particularly in the journal Le Monde. This act later turned out to be orchestrated by the French Ministry of the Interior and the General Directorate of the National Police. This leak also served to link Abdallah and the LARF to the previously mentioned wave of bomb attacks. 

French newspaper le Nouvel Observateur would later reveal that this safe house had already been discovered by the French authorities months prior, and that the leak was strategically timed so as to have a pretext not to free Abdallah and effectively commit State perjury.

What then followed was a McCarthyist-style repressive attack that targeted Arab Marxists and anti-imperialist activists in France, which saw the arrest of academics, researchers and journalists. Media outlets from across the political spectrum contributed in legitimising this reactionary campaign. One such journalist-for-hire was Mediapart co-founder and then-journalist for le Monde, Edwy Plenel. Today an avid supporter of the ‘Zionist left’ and Israel’s supposed ‘right to exist’, Plenel is widely lauded as a beacon of French alternative and investigative journalism, and applauded for his supposed defiance of mainstream media. Far from this illusory image he carefully crafted of himself throughout the years, Plenel had actively served the French authorities' reactionary efforts by disseminating unfounded accusations against Georges Abdallah and members of his family. In 1986, Plenel wrote:

  "Police reportedly identified the men behind the Rue de Rennes bomb attacks. [...] The culprits are Émile Abdallah and Émile Khoury, LARF members who have been wanted since 1985. [...] This lead remains unchanged, it is the rebirth of the terrorist network set up in Europe from 1981 to 1984 by the LARF, under the name of CSPPA."

All of this would later be proven false. 

‍3. The Complicit Lawyer

Perhaps the most scandalous actor in Georges Abdallah’s show trial was Jean-Paul Mazurier. Mazurier, one of Abdallah’s lawyers, would reveal on 6 March 1987, less than a week after the ruling, that he was acting as an agent for the DGSE - the French external intelligence agency. From 1984 to 1986, the imposturous lawyer was informally salaried by the DGSE to extract information from his client, in clear violation of professional ethics, and in breach of attorney-client privilege. Despite Mazurier’s espionage, no additional evidence was collected by the DGSE through its imposturous lawyer, another manifestation of Abdallah’s committedness not to divulge any information that would compromise his comrades or his organization.

It was only when Mazurier found out that his spying activity was about to be leaked to the press that he decided to come out of silence, without missing the opportunity to promote his book ‘L’agent Noir: Une Taupe dans l’Affaire Abdallah’ (Dark Agent: A Mole in the Abdallah Affair). This book only represented a desperate attempt by Mazurier to save face before inevitably getting disbarred. Despite these revelations, Minister of Justice Albin Chalandon denied Abdallah’s lawyer Jacques Vergès’ request for a retrial.

Mazurier’s book was already in the process of production during Abdallah’s trial. The book was co-written with a journalist from Libération, despite this, no news of Mazurier being an intelligence agent was ever leaked to the press throughout the duration of the trial. This stands as a stark manifestation of the newspaper’s hypocrisy, having actively taken part in the previous demonization campaigns targeting the Abdallah brothers.

More recently, Libération, which is widely perceived as a left-leaning newspaper, has actively taken part in the propaganda efforts aiming to manufacture consent for the Israeli genocide in Gaza. In fact, the newspaper’s current editor-in-chief and head of editorial strategy is Dov Alfon, an Israeli propagandist and a former IDF soldier serving for the infamous Unit 8200.

The Struggle Continues

‍From inside his prison cell, Abdallah stayed connected to social and political struggles across the world. After nearly 41 years behind bars, he continues to regularly read the news and analyze political events. As a Marxist-Leninist, he understood that ultra reactionary measures were an expression of the general crises generated by capitalism. He writes:

  “We all know how crucial the current period is. The general crisis of the system continues to deepen, and the bourgeoisie projects its perpetual ultra reactionary formulas. It sacrifices the mere survival of half of humanity for the sake of its profits. Reaction sometimes rises concealed, but it is rising more and more openly, especially when the process of fascistization is in full effect. Conservatisms strut about while social and racial discrimination exacerbate. Not a single month passes by, without seeing a European State announcing the implementation of a security act or of decrees regarding more restrictive social norms or the creation of a special brigade and its participation in an intervention against an oppressed people. All over the continent, parties that were formerly auto proclaimed fascists are becoming institutionalized to claim a recovered virginity and take part in the new governments that are being formed."

This statement issued by Georges Abdallah, although written 20 years ago, is perfectly fit to diagnose the current situation in the West even today, particularly in Europe with the rapid rise in popularity of fascist movements in recent years. Fascist propagandists, as well as complacent bourgeois liberals, are exploiting the periodic economic crises to incite against those dubbed as ‘minorities’ along identitarian lines. Following a class collaborationist approach, fascists and their enablers divert popular contempt away from the actual oppressors - the capitalist class, to what they consider to be ‘sexual and gender minorities’, ‘religious minorities’, communists and, above all else, foreign workers. On that note, Abdallah states:

  “In this 'feldgrau' atmosphere, how can we be surprised by the nostalgia centered around the "blessed times" of the colonies? Neoliberals are conducting full-scale destruction of labor law, as well as housing and educational rights... The progress that had been achieved through multiple generations of workers is today being swept away with the flip of a hand. Entire regions are plunged into an unforeseen human disaster. To better conceal these ravages and divide the popular forces, vile media campaigns mobilize public opinion under the name of "security" while condemning the new dangerous classes. Similar to the late 19th century and the 1930s, the forces of reaction are pushing the specter of the foreign worker to incite fear. Foreign workers are accused of not being "good citizens", being deprived of regular jobs, having a different religion, or not having any religion. The advocacy in favor of apartheid and all forms to social segregation can not even be concealed anymore.  On the contrary, for many intellectuals and politicians, this advocacy characterizes their postmodernist spirit able to apprehend – "without any taboos" — globalization and the novel societal problems.”

This excerpt was written by Abdallah in 2005, as the French repressive apparatus was launching a full-scale onslaught against the descendents of migrant workers and the residents of the impoverished ‘banlieues’ (suburbs). Georges Abdallah also points out the danger of adopting a ‘postmodernist’ approach to analyze these problems. Adopting this approach leads one to conclude that the questions of racialism, sexism, homophobia as well as classism are different issues that intersect with one another. Following this logic, one is led to limit their struggle to the specific forms of oppression that directly affect them, and strive for their own individual emancipation, as Bouamama notes. Although specific forms of oppression such as racism and sexism do have objective repercussions and should, by all means, be combated, they are nonetheless tied down to the central question of class struggle against a whole system of capitalist oppression, which also reproduces social discrimination against ‘undesired’ demographics. More recently, it is these same bourgeois upholders of the capitalist system who are promoting the idea of a ‘civilizational crusade’ against migrants and other marginalized populations in European societies. Particularly in France, these efforts have been spearheaded by a group of well connected multi-billionaires who have built their own right-wing propaganda mouthpieces. The most infamous among these are Vincent Bolloré, Xavier Niel, Bernard Arnault and, until recently, Israeli billionaire Patrick Drahi. 

The constant reactionary propaganda disseminated by the media these magnates own can not be separated from the unconditional support these same outlets displayed to Israel during its genocidal war in Gaza as well as its far-reaching onslaught against the entire region. Platforms such as CNews, BFMTV and Le JDD have consistently portrayed Israel as the vanguard in the global ‘War on Terror’ and a partner in the ‘clash of civilizations’ to safeguard ‘Western Values’. The rhetoric used in this context is strikingly similar to the one pushed across various imperialist media outlets more than 20 years ago to manufacture consent for the 2003 invasion of Iraq, which Abdallah analyzed as follows:

  “Of course, no one is ignorant of the fact that US imperialists do not wage wars merely to satisfy the killing spree of this or that president, or to satisfy hatred against this or that people. The general legal framework established by the Bush administration to impose a new economic model in Iraq portend in this regard. This imperialist framework was developed with the blessing of major multinational companies, such as Bechtel, Haliburton, and others… Bush may present many arguments to justify waging this war, but they never make the headlines of major imperialist newspapers. The invasion and occupation of Iraq demonstrated that the imperialist countries, in the name of the ‘war on terror’, aimed to impose a framework that meets the needs of multinational companies. The projects of Bush, Rumsfeld, Perle and others, date back to the late 1980’s; they are determined to plunder the Iraqi economy and its natural resources and place them permanently at the disposal of multinational companies. It is certain that Iraq is only the beginning. The current situation in Palestine, and the threats looming over Lebanon, against Syria, against Iran, and against the entire region, portent this trend.”

Abdallah’s analysis is only confirmed by the events that have unfolded since, particularly since the Aqsa Flood operations. He also always understood what is to be done: Global solidarity in the face of global imperialism. A form of solidarity that expresses itself, not in moral or idealistic terms as Bouamama points out, but in the material sense of the word. In practice, this means using short-term tactics and a long-term strategy with the aim of weakening imperialism everywhere in the world. As Palestinian Marxist Ghassan Kanafani said:

  “Wherever you strike imperialism, you damage it and serve world revolution.”

This global struggle against global imperialism, however, should take into account the differences in material conditions found in each country or in each society to determine the revolutionary tactics and strategy which, of course, will be strikingly different in the periphery countries than in the countries of the imperialist core.

On Abdallah’s Liberation

Abdallah was imprisoned in multiple French detention centers. Since 1994, he has been imprisoned in Lannemezan prison in Southern France. Abdallah had always espoused the principles of internationalism during his struggle and militancy. LARF maintained close ties with various European armed revolutionary groups, including the French organization ‘Action Directe’, the German ‘Red Army Factions’ and the Italian ‘Red Brigades’. 

Abdallah’s ties to members of these groups and his belief in the unity of their struggle and of their shared interest was only consolidated once imprisoned. In Lannemezan, Abdallah frequented other revolutionary political prisoners, including members of the armed Basque Marxist-Leninist organization ETA, as well as the co-founder of Action Directe, Jean-Marc Rouillan. Both Abdallah and Rouillan, along with dozens of other Marxist and Anarchist political prisoners, were co-signatories of the 19 June 1999 platform, proclaiming the refusal their collective refusal of any attempts by State authorities to blackmail them and other revolutionary prisoners into repentance in exchange for liberation. No to repentance, No to capitulation. No justice, No peace, read the platform.

Georges Abdallah, like other revolutionary political prisoners who preceded him, firmly refused to repent or express any regret over the path he took. When confronted with the accusations of the plaintiffs in trial, although Abdallah did not recognize directly taking part in the execution of the assassinations attributed to him, he still maintained the legitimacy of these acts:

  “These are the ABC’s of your justice, the content of this trial and of these accusations which, on the other hand, are for me only honors that I did not deserve. If our people had not entrusted me with the honor of taking part in these anti-imperialist actions that you are attributing to me, I at least have the honor to be accused of committing them by your court, and I have the honor of defending their legitimacy while facing the criminal legality of the executioners, and I shout loud and clear: Let us tread on any impediment to the legitimacy of our struggle. Let us tread on peace of the type that manifests itself in our lands in the terms of ‘Peace in Galilee’.”

According to French law, prisoners sentenced to life in prison without preventive detention are eligible for conditional liberation after having served 15 years. In the case of Georges Ibrahim Abdallah, he has been eligible for conditional liberation since 27 October 1999. 

Since then, 10 of Abdallah’s requests for release were denied. In November 2003, the regional jurisdiction of conditional liberation of the court of Pau ruled in favor of the conditional liberation of Georges Abdallah. This decision was subsequently appealed by the ‘Parquet’ (representing the French State) leading to the overturning of the decision. This also prompted the government to pass a new law altogether: The Law of 23 January 2006 on the struggle against terrorism stipulates that rulings on terrorism cases fall under the exclusive competence of the ‘Paris judge for the enforcement of sentences’ (Juge d’application des Peines de Paris) and the ‘Paris chamber for the enforcement of sentences’ (Chambre d’Application des Peines de Paris). This centralization of terrorism cases makes it more unlikely for Abdallah to obtain conditional release, as the Paris-based magistrate in charge of ruling these cases is more bound to conform to political decisions dictated by his higher-ups.

On 21 November 2012, Abdallah’s 8th request for conditional release was accepted for the first time by the French Anti Terrorist Tribunal for the enforcement of Sentences. His release was, however, conditioned on the signing of a deportation decree by the minister of the Interior. 

On 11 January 2013, the spokeswoman of the US State Department reacted to this ruling in a press briefing, stating:

  “Obviously we are concerned about this release, we don't think he should be released, and we are continuing our consultations with the French government. We have serious concerns that he could return to the battlefield etc…”

Then-French minister of interior, member of the ‘Socialist Party’ and long-time Israel supporter Manuel Valls (who is today widely described as being ‘France’s most hated politician’), refused to sign Abdallah’s deportation decree back to Lebanon. In result, the French Court of Cassation ruled on 4 April 2013 that Abdallah could not be released. Five years later, Wikileaks would shed lights on the US pressure directly exerted on French politicians to prevent Abdallah’s release, by sharing an email sent by then-US Secretary of Foreign Affairs Hillary Clinton to the then-French Minister of Foreign Affairs Laurent Fabius, urging him not to allow for the release of Abdallah to go through. The email reads:

  "Although the French Government has no legal authority to overturn the Court of Appeal’s January 10 decision, we hope French officials might find another basis to challenge the decision’s legality."

Between the years of 2013 to 2024, all of Abdallah’s requests for conditional liberation were denied. This consistent opposition to the liberation of Abdallah, who is turning 74 years old in April, is clear. The French Public Prosecutor (Procureur de la République) said it best in 2005:

  “Abdallah is a revolutionary communist, he admits it himself. Can you imagine, a communist… He even goes on hunger strikes in support of Palestinian prisoners, he even says ‘long live the Intifada’... And after 22 years in prison, if he goes back to Beirut, for the residents of the poor neighborhoods, he will be a martyr… This is unbearable! This is what the Americans and the Israelis will reproach to us. This is why, Mr. President, your decision is political.”

This is precisely why the US, Israel and their imperialist outcome fear the outcome of Abdallah’s release. Because Abdallah never repented, he never reneged on his beliefs, and because he represents one of the last members of a dying breed of armed internationalist revolutionary communists who have pursued their imperialist enemies everywhere. 

Throughout the last 16 months, the French judicial apparatus has stood out in its strict crackdown on all pro-Palestine organizing, following the French state’s unconditional support for Israel’s genocide in Gaza. Abdallah talked about the situation in Gaza on October 26, 2024, in a letter addressed to his comrades who have taken part in the annual protest in Lannemezan demanding his liberation:

  “Comrades and friends, in this time of global capitalism’s crisis and the exacerbation of all its contradictions—this era of war, large-scale massacres, repression, fascism, propaganda and manipulation, of great struggles and mobilization, and especially of the inspiring surge of active youth amid the inherent barbarism of dying capitalism… for the first time in human history, millions of people are actively witnessing an ongoing genocide. For over 380 days, the genocidaires continue to wreak havoc in Gaza and the West Bank, now expanding their war to Lebanon with the active support of the main imperialist powers in the West. Yet, thanks to the heroic resistance of the Palestinian popular masses and their fighting vanguards, and thanks also to the massive solidarity mobilization around the world, Palestine resists and, more than ever, reclaims its rightful place at the forefront of the international scene.

With this in mind, dear comrades, dear friends, it may be useful to remember that active international solidarity is proving to be an indispensable weapon in the fight against the ongoing settler colonialism in Palestine and the genocidal war deeply inherent to it. It is always through this active solidarity that we can participate in changing the balance of power here, in the belly of the imperialist beast, and elsewhere in building the ‘Historical Bloc’, a global framework and potential subject of the Palestinian national liberation movement.”

This letter alone highlights the failure of the French repressive system in quelling Abdallah’s revolutionary will. It will also fail in quelling the pro-Palestine movement in France despite the systematic targeting of main organizers and the threat of dissolution targeting pro-Palestine organizations, namely ‘Collectif Palestine Vaincra’ (The Palestine Will Triumph Collective), which has historically been one of the main organizations supporting Abdallah and his cause.

Solidarity with ‘Collectif Palestine Vaincra’

Freedom to Georges Ibrahim Abdallah.