The Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) has condemned Palestinian Authority (PA) president and dictator Mahmoud Abbas for stating on Monday that no Jew must be allowed to reside within a future Palestinian state. Abbas has made similar statements before, but the ZOA believes that his reiteration of this racist policy on the eve of Israeli/Palestinian negotiations make his statement particularly egregious. The ZOA has called for public condemnation of Abbas by President Barack Obama and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, at the very least, the suspension of renewed talks until and unless Abbas publicly repudiates and apologizes for this statement.
In a briefing with mostly Egyptian journalists, the PA dictator Abbas said on Monday that, “In a final resolution, we would not see the presence of a single Israeli – civilian or soldier – on our lands” (Noah Browning, ‘Abbas wants ‘not a single Israeli’ in future Palestinian state,’ Reuters, July 29, 2013).
Abbas’ Fatah/PA, including PA figures often mistakenly regarded in the West as moderates, have insisted that a future Palestinian state must be judenrein and all Jews currently living in communities in Judea and Samaria must be uprooted:
- PA president Mahmoud Abbas: “We have frankly said, and always will say: If there is an independent Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital, we won’t agree to the presence of one Israeli in it … when a Palestinian state is established, it would have no Israeli presence in it” (Khaled Abu Toameh, ‘Abbas vows: No room for Israelis in Palestinian state,’ Jerusalem Post, December 25, 2010).
- Saeb Ereqat, senior Fatah/PA official, former PA foreign minister: “…nobody should agree to Israeli settlers remaining in the Palestinian [state]” (‘MEMRI: Saeb Ereqat: Over the Years, Israel Has Gradually Withdrawn from Its Positions; Therefore, We Have No Reason to Hurry,’ Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI), July 13, 2009).
- Ahmed Qurei, former PA prime minister and former PA senior negotiator: “There can be no peace with the presence of these settlement blocs in the West Bank” (Khaled Abu Toameh, ‘Qurei: No room for Jews in West Bank,’ Jerusalem Post, December 13, 2008).
- PLO ambassador to the U.S., Maen Areikat: “I think it would be in the best interest of the two people to be separated.” (Oren Dorell, ‘PLO ambassador says Palestinian state should be free of Jews,’ USA Today, September 14, 2011).
- Dr. Sari Nusseibeh, the Dean of Al-Quds University, widely touted as a Palestinian moderate: “The Israelis now living in the territories of the future Palestinian state should return to living within the borders of the state of Israel. No Jew in the world, now or in the future … will have the right to return, to live, or to demand to live in Hebron, in East Jerusalem, or anywhere in the Palestinian state” (Interview on Al-Jazeera, November 30, 2007, translation in ‘Palestinian Researcher Dr. Sari Nusseibeh on the Return of Palestinian Refugees,’ Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI), November 30, 2007).
ZOA National President Morton A. Klein said, “Mahmoud Abbas – whose elected term of office ended in 2009, since which he has not permitted presidential elections – has reiterated in stark terms the PA position: that it intends to create a Palestinian state in which no Jews will be permitted to live. “Whereas Israel has a large Arab and Muslim minority, the Palestinians openly demand that their state be judenrein.
“The Palestinian demand for a Jew-free state is not only obscene and anti-Semitic in itself, but exposes the Palestinian rejection of Israel as a Jewish state and thus the reason for the absence of peace. They refuse to accept the truth of the Jewish religious, legal and historical connection to Israel and thus the right of Jews to have their own state in their biblical homeland. They therefore not only refuse to accept Israel as a Jewish state – something they have stated publicly and repeatedly, even to Western audiences – but also insist that no Jews remain in Judea and Samaria.
“To acknowledge the right of Jews to live in these territories, as Jews are morally as well as legally entitled to do under the terms of the 1920 Sam Remo settlement (a legal right that has never superseded by a subsequent, legally binding agreement), would immediately invalidate the Palestinians’ rejection of the religious, legal and historical basis of Israel’s existence – so they refuse to do this.
“Israel has continually made one-sided concessions to the PA, most recently, in the past week in agreeing to free jailed terrorists – a standing, anti-peace Palestinian demand in itself – in return for literally nothing. Instead of concessions producing Palestinian moderation, we see Abbas repeating his obscene demand for a Jew-free Palestinian state.
“In these circumstances, at the very least, upcoming peace talks should be suspended pending Abbas’ public repudiation and apology for this statement. We urge President Obama and Prime Minister Netanyahu to immediately condemn Abbas’ anti-peace, racist statement. To do otherwise would indicate unconscionable acceptance of this racist and vicious Palestinian position.”
“At a time when then the Middle East is riven by horror and turmoil, especially in Egypt, Syria, Libya and Iran, this is no time to establish another terrorist, racist dictatorship in the Middle East called ‘Palestine.’”