Dear Mr. Klein,
A couple of weeks you said that “The goal of the Palestinian Authority is not to set up a state, but to work for the destruction of the Jewish state.”
Can you prove it?
Best,
S.R.
The Palestinian Authority (PA) is ruled by Fatah, the terrorist movement co-founded by Yasser Arafat and Mahmoud Abbas, and whose Fatah Constitution to this day calls for Israel’s elimination (Article 12) and the use of terrorism as an indispensible element in the struggle to achieve that goal (Article 19). Fatah’s own Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades is a recognized terrorist group, one of whose leaders, Abu Ahmed, said last year that “There is no change in our official position. Fatah as a movement never recognized Israel.” Indeed, Abbas, president of the PA, himself said as much in Arabic in a TV interview in October 2006: ‘It is not required of Hamas, or of Fatah, or of the Popular Front to recognize Israel.’
If Abbas were committed to peace with Israel, why did he endorse the ‘Prisoners Plan,’ produced by jailed terrorists, and the Mecca Agreement with Hamas, both of which reject Israel’s existence while promoting terrorism?
If Abbas were committed to peace with Israel, why is Israel not shown on any map or school atlas in the PA territories? Only ‘Palestine’ is listed. Why does PA TV, to this day, regularly show all of Israel painted in the colors of the Palestinian flag? This ‘Palestine’-only message is repeated throughout their culture in school books, crossword puzzles, school and street names and children’s programs – just as their songs, textbooks and media regularly refer to Haifa, Tiberias and Beersheba as ‘Palestine.’
Just after the Annapolis summit, PA radio presented Hitler heroically, calling his victories in 1940 ‘his golden year,’ while his defeat and death were coined, ‘his bitter end,’ and no mention was made of the Holocaust. If Arabs repeatedly praise Hitler, as they do, can it be seriously argued that that they truly accept the existence of a Jewish state?
Abbas has regularly stated that Israel is the ‘Zionist enemy,’ that ‘Allah loves the martyr,’ that ‘we must unite the Hamas and Fatah blood in the struggle against Israel,’ and that we ‘will continue in the path of the late President Arafat until we fulfill his dreams.’ He insists that the ‘issue of refugees is non-negotiable,’ which makes further clear his desire to end Israel as Jewish state by promoting a massive influx of Arabs. Abbas himself refused President Bush’s request at the 2005 Aqaba summit to announce his acceptance of Israel as a Jewish state; a refusal he and other senior PA officials made explicit again in the weeks preceding the recent Annapolis summit.
An October 2006 poll showed that two-thirds of Palestinians supported Hamas’ refusal to recognize Israel, while a February 2007 poll shows that 75% of Palestinian Arabs do not think that Israel has a right to exist — and Abbas is doing everything he can to fulfill that dream.
Look at the history of the Palestinian Arabs — lack of Palestinian statehood has never been the issue: the Palestinians have turned down statehood on every occasion it was offered to them — 1937, 1947, and 2000 — because in all three cases, it would have encompassed accepting the existence of a neighboring Jewish state.
M.A.K.