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Arafat
Palestinian leader. Born in Jerusalem, he graduated from the Univ. of Cairo as a civil engineer and served in the Egyptian army during the 1956 war with Israel. That year, working as an engineer in Kuwait, he cofounded the guerrilla organization Fatah, which became the leading military component of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), which he led from 1969. In 1974 the PLO was formally recognized by the U.N., and Arafat became the first leader of a nongovernmental organization to address the U.N. In 1988 he acknowledged Israel's right to exist, and in 1993 he formally recognized Israel during direct talks regarding land controlled by Israel since the Six-Day War. In 1994 he shared the Nobel Peace Prize with Y. Rabin and S. Peres. In 1996 he became president of the new Palestinian Authority.


RAF
Armed service charged with the air defense of Britain and other international defense obligations. It originated in 1911, when an air battalion of the Royal Engineers was formed, with one balloon and one airplane company. In World War I the naval and military wings of the British air forces were separate, but in 1918 they were merged into the RAF. An RAF cadet college was established at Cranwell, Lincolnshire, in 1920, and an RAF staff college at Andover, Hampshire, in 1922. At the outbreak of World War II, the RAF's first-line strength was about 2,000 aircraft. RAF fighter pilots distinguished themselves during the Battle of Britain against the numerically superior German Luftwaffe.


Aragon
French poet, novelist, and essayist. He was introduced by A. Breton into avant-garde circles, and the two cofounded the Surrealist review Litt\u00e9 rature in 1919. From 1927 he was increasingly a political activist and spokesman for communism, which resulted in a break with the Surrealists. Among his works are the novel tetralogy Le monde r\u00e9 el (4 vols., 1933-44), describing the class struggle of the proletariat; the huge novel Les communistes (6 vols., 1949-51); novels of veiled autobiography; and volumes of poems expressing patriotism and love for his wife. He was editor of the communist weekly of arts and literature Les lettres fran\u00e7 aises 1953-72.

Autonomous community (pop., 1996 est.: 1,188,000), NE Spain. It occupies an area of 18,398 sq mi (47,651 sq km); its capital is at the city of Saragossa. It is roughly coextensive with the historical kingdom of Aragon. Mountains, incl. the Pyrenees, dominate the relief north and south of the Ebro River, which bisects Aragon. Established in 1035 by Ramiro I, the historical kingdom grew as land was retaken from the Moors: Saragossa, the capital of the Almoravid kingdom, fell to Alfonso I of Aragon in 1118, and the reconquest of present-day Aragon was completed by the late 12th cent. In the 13th-14th cent., it came to rule Sicily, Sardinia, Naples, and Navarre. In the 15th cent. Ferdinand married Isabella of Castile, uniting the kingdoms of ...

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