„Palestinian leaders on Saturday mourned the death of former Cuban president Fidel Castro, hailing the iconic revolutionary president as a longtime supporter of the Palestinian cause and a comrade in the struggle against ‚Zionist imperialism.‘ Castro, who died on Friday in Havana at the age of 90, was remembered by various Palestinian Authority groups for his close relationship with late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, and early support of ‚armed resistance‘ against Israel. The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, a secular, socialist Palestinian terrorist group, was among the first organizations to mourn Castro’s death in a statement that praised the late Cuban leader for ‚consistently [standing] with the oppressed peoples of the world in their confrontation with imperialism, Zionism, racism and capitalism.‘ (…) The Palestinian National Council, the Palestinian Democratic Union and the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine also released statements mourning the passing of the revolutionary icon. (…)
Castro, who ruled Cuba from 1959 until 2006, was a staunch supporter of Palestinian self-determination, and often leveled harsh criticism of Israel’s policies vis-à-vis the Palestinians. (…) In the 1980s, Castro’s Cuba supported the Palestinian Liberation Organization and provided military support for the Fatah movement as well as training for Palestinian terrorists during the First Intifada in 1987. (…) In 2014, he accused Israel of committing a ‚Palestinian Holocaust in Gaza,‘ and described the military offensive against Hamas and other terror groups that summer as a ‚new, repugnant form of fascism.‘ In a brief conciliatory moment however, Castro in 2010 told American journalist Jeffrey Goldberg of the Atlantic that Israel has ‚without a doubt‘ the right to exist as a Jewish state and that he had ‚nothing but sympathy‘ for the persecution of Jews through history.“ (Tamar Pileggi: „Palestinian leaders mourn loss of ‚comrade‘ Castro“)
