George Habash

George Habash (1 August 1926 – 26 January 2008) was a Palestinian politician and physician who was the founder and first general-secretary of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) from 1967 to 2000.

Habash was born in Lydda, Mandatory Palestine, in 1926. In 1948, while he was a medical student at the American University of Beirut, he returned to his hometown of Lydda during the 1948 Arab–Israeli War. The city's Arab Palestinian population, including his family, was forcibly driven out in an event known as the Lydda Death March, which led to the death of his sister. In 1951, after graduating first in his class from medical school, Habash worked in Palestinian refugee camps in Jordan and ran a clinic in Amman. He later relocated to Syria and Lebanon.