Khaled, Leila (1944–)

A member of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), Leila Khaled became famous in the late 1960s and early 1970s for being one of the few Arab women publicly involved in terrorist activities.

One of 13 children, Khaled was only four years old when her family was forced to leave her birthplace of Haifa in Palestine due to the creation of the Israeli state in 1948. They settled in a refugee camp in Tyre, Lebanon. She and her siblings shared the belief that Palestine should be liberated and the refugees should be allowed to return home. While she was a teenager, she joined the Arab Nationalist Movement to fight for her beliefs. In 1963, to help her struggling family, Khaled became an English teacher in Kuwait. It was there that she became a member of the political group that would lead to her fame, the PFLP, created by George Habash and Wadi Haddad.

The Israeli defeat of the Arabs in 1967 was the impetus for Khaled's move to Jordan to join the resistance. She was trained by Haddad to hijack airplanes. On August 29, 1969, Khaled and a colleague hijacked TWA Flight 840 en route from Rome to Tel Aviv. No passengers were harmed, but the case attracted extensive media coverage because female hijackers were not common, especially not ones with a conservative Arab background. Khaled became well known as a terrorist to some, and as a hero to others. In a famous picture of her from that time, she is seen holding a gun and wearing a ring made of a hand-grenade pin and a bullet.

Leila Khaled, 24, a member of the Marxist-oriented Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), a radical Palestinian faction, is shown in Amman, Jordan, in 1970.

(AP Photo/Hagop Toranian. © 2011 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)

Before attempting her second hijacking, Khaled underwent several cosmetic surgeries so that she would be unrecognizable. On September 6, 1970, she and Patrick Arguello hijacked an El Al jet flying from Amsterdam to New York. No passengers were harmed, but security guards on the plane opened fire and killed Arguello. The plane landed at London's Heathrow Airport, where Khaled was arrested and detained in the Ealing police station for 23 days. Prime Minister Edward Heath set her free in exchange for the release of 56 hostages taken [Page 326]in a PFLP hijacking that occurred after Khaled's arrest. Since 1970, Khaled has taken a less prominent role in the Palestinian struggle to regain their homeland. She was associated with the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) until 1982. As of 2010, she was living in Amman, Jordan, with her second husband and two sons, and she remained an ardent supporter of the Arab movement.