The Palestinian Authority's ruling faction, Fatah, is boasting that its members have carried out most of the recent terrorism against Israelis. "Fatah leaders are also calling for more violence against Israel," and are praising the perpetrators of the recent massacre of Israeli as "heroic martyrs," they have said.

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Yet the Biden administration's response echoes the ancient Japanese proverb: See none of Fatah's evil actions, hear none of Fatah's evil words, and speak no truth about Fatah's evil record.

Fatah is by far the largest of the 10 factions that make up the PA and its parent body, the Palestinian Liberation Organization. Fatah, the PA and the PLO were all headed by Yasser Arafat and are now chaired by his successor, 87-year-old Mahmoud Abbas. In signing the Oslo Accords of 1993-1995, Fatah committed to lay down its weapons, combat terrorists and live in peace with Israel.

But instead of doing so, the head of Fatah's Jenin branch announced on May 30 that "a national decision" has been made to "fight" Israel and "confront it with every weapon." Instead of combating terrorists, Fatah's Bethlehem branch publicly praised the terrorists who recently slaughtered four Israelis near the town of Eli. That June 20 Fatah announcement hailed the killers as "righteous martyrs" and "heroic martyrdom-seekers."

Instead of living in peace with Israel, Fatah is "leading" the latest waves of anti-Israel violence, according to Fatah itself. The Fatah Commission of Information and Culture, on its official Facebook page on June 17, posted a video asserting: "If we ask about the armed resistance in the West Bank, the Fatah Movement is the one that is leading it. The Fatah members have more than two-thirds of the percentage of martyrs … "

(Thanks to Palestinian Media Watch for the translations.)

Following the signing of the first Oslo agreement in September 1993, Israelis and American Jews were shocked that terrorist attacks were continuing. After all, the entire premise of the accords was that terrorism would stop.

Palestinian spokesmen and their apologists claimed the ongoing attacks were not the work of Fatah but were perpetrated by "independent" groups that Fatah supposedly could not control, with names such as the "Hawks" and the "Tanzim."

It was implausible that those groups had sprung up overnight, fully formed, with an entire network of highly trained bombers and shooters already in place. Sure enough, those names soon disappeared from public discourse and were replaced by a new "independent" terror group called the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades.

The "Brigades" claimed responsibility for attacks on a bat mitzvah celebration in Hadera (six dead, 33 wounded); the suicide bombing at Jerusalem's Yeshivat Beit Yisrael (11 dead, including two infants, and 50 wounded); and the suicide bombing at the Tel Aviv Central bus station (23 dead, more than 100 injured), among many other outrages.

The US State Department added the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades to the official US list of designated terrorist groups but refused to acknowledge they were part of Fatah.

Then-PA Prime Minister Ahmed Qurei told the London-based Asharq al-Awsat newspaper: "We have clearly declared that the Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades are part of Fatah. We are committed to them and Fatah bears full responsibility for the group." (The Jerusalem Post, June 20, 2004)

Investigative journalists from the BBC documented that Fatah was allocating $50,000 monthly to the Brigades. Yet the State Department still refused to see any of Fatah's evil, hear any of its evil or speak the truth about its evil.

Finally, in June 2005, a study by the US government's own Congressional Research Service reported: "On December 18, 2003, Fatah asked the leaders of the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades to join the Fatah Council, recognizing it officially as part of the Fatah organization."

All of which is reminiscent of the fiction of "Black September." When the terrorists who carried out the Munich Olympics massacre in 1972 and the murder of the US ambassador in Sudan in 1973 claimed to be from "Black September," not Fatah, there was good reason for suspicion.

One of the Munich planners, Mohammed Oudeh (Abu Daoud), was quoted in the Jordanian newspaper Al-Dustur in 1972, saying, "There is no such organization as Black September. Fatah announces its own operations under this name so that Fatah will not appear as the direct executor of the operation." Still, the State Department refused to see the truth.

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Later, it turned out that a telegram sent by the State Department to American embassies around the world on March 13, 1973 acknowledged the truth: "The Black September Organization is a cover term for Fatah's terrorist operations executed by Fatah's intelligence organization. … For all intents and purposes no significant distinction now can be made between the BSO and Fatah."

"Black September." "Hawks." "Tanzim." "Al-Aqsa Martyrs." All turned out to be front groups for Fatah. More recently, some media outlets have been referring to a supposedly new terrorist group called the "Lions' Den." It will be interesting to see how many "Lions' Den" members turn out to be Fatah members, especially now that Fatah is boasting that it is carrying out the large majority of the terror attacks.

The Biden administration, however, refuses to see any Fatah members carrying out attacks, refuses to hear Fatah officials endorsing terrorism, and refuses to say anything bad about Fatah – because to acknowledge the truth is to admit that Fatah never gave up terrorism, Arafat and Abbas never wanted peace, and creating a Palestinian state won't bring peace. That's a painful truth for many people to acknowledge. But the truth must be faced, no matter how painful.

Reprinted with permission from JNS.org.

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Elan Ganeles of Connecticut was murdered by Palestinian Arab terrorists this week, thus becoming the 147th American citizen to be killed by Palestinians since 1968.

Yet not a single Palestinian Arab terrorist has ever been brought to the United States to stand trial for any of those crimes. Think about that: 147 dead Americans and not one prosecution.

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The problem is not that we can't find the suspects. The whereabouts of some of them are already known to the authorities. In fact, the Israeli government has publicly identified some of them as members of the Palestinian security forces.

One of the killers, Ahlam Tamimi, is living openly in Jordan and until recently was the host of her own radio show. Tamimi was one of the terrorists who carried out the August 2001 Sbarro Pizzeria bombing in Jerusalem, in which 15 people were killed–including 15-year-old Malki Roth and Mrs. Shoshana Greenbaum, both American citizens. In addition, 122 people were injured, among them four Americans.

The problem is not the extradition process. The US has an extradition treaty with Jordan, signed in 1995. So, Tamimi could be handed over right now.

As for other suspects, the Palestinian Authority has one of the largest per capita security forces in the world, armed and trained by the US If the PA wanted to find those suspects, it certainly has the manpower and resources to do so.

Although the US does not have a formal extradition treaty with the PA, the PA could still hand over the suspects if it wanted to. Many countries send fugitive criminals to the US for prosecution outside of regular extradition channels because those channels are often time-consuming and expensive.

So, if the whereabouts of the killers are known or can be easily determined, and if there is no logistical obstacle to surrendering them, what's the problem?

The problem is politics. The Biden administration does not want to prosecute Palestinian terrorists because doing so would interfere with its goal of maintaining friendly relations with the PA in order to bring about the creation of a Palestinian state.

The US knows that the PA will resist any request to hand over the killers of Americans since the Palestinians regard the killers as heroes. For the US to pursue justice, it would have to be willing to confront the PA, which would involve political and financial pressure on the Palestinian leadership. That would interfere with the Biden administration's warm relationship with the PA

The result is that justice for Elan Ganeles and all the other American victims of Palestinian terrorism will be sacrificed in order to avoid angering the Palestinians.

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However, there are concrete steps the Biden administration could take right now if it were serious about pursuing justice.

First, The FBI could join the investigation. The Biden administration sent the FBI to investigate the accidental death of the Arab-American journalist Shireen Abu Akleh, so why isn't it sending the FBI to join the manhunt for those who carried out the deliberate murder of Elan Ganeles and other American victims of Palestinian terror?

Then, The Justice Department could offer a reward for information leading to the capture of the killers of Elan Ganeles. It offers rewards in the cases of other terrorists who have harmed Americans around the world but only in three cases of American victims of Palestinian terror. Three–out of the hundreds of Palestinian attacks in which Americans were killed or wounded.

Finally, The US could apply financial pressure on the PA The Biden administration is sending $600 million in aid to the Palestinian Arabs this year. That will be used to pay the PA's bills, thus freeing up funds for the PA to pay salaries to terrorists, including the killers of Elan Ganeles. The US could reduce its aid package in proportion to the amount that Elan's killers will receive.

The Biden administration's failure to take such steps suggests that it is not seriously interested in justice for the American victims of Palestinian Arab terrorism.

Reprinted with permission from JNS.org.

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What did the recent "Asian Under 23 Fencing Championship" have to do with Israel? More than you might think.

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At that event, held in Bangkok, some fencers from Kuwait refused to take part in a match with their Israeli counterparts. The Palestinian Authority was thrilled to hear the news. According to a Palestinian Media Watch translation, the official PA newspaper Al-Hayat Al-Jadida reported that the chairman of the Palestinian Fencing Association, speaking on behalf of the PA, publicly praised the Kuwaiti fencers for "their awe-inspiring and noble position" in "stepping down from competing against the Israeli fencers out of opposition to normalization in the field of sports."

The international community seems to have become accustomed to the Palestinian Arab leadership taking these kinds of hostile steps against Israel. There was no coverage of the fencing incident in the news media, and no protests from the State Department or other governments.

So, since the media and the State Department won't acknowledge what happened, it is worth reiterating that the PA's action was a direct and blatant violation of the Oslo Accords.

The opening words of Oslo I (signed in 1993) require the Palestinian leadership to "put an end to decades of confrontation and conflict." Later, in the Oslo II agreement (Chapter 4, Article XII, signed in 1995), the PA committed itself to fostering "understanding and tolerance" with Israel.

In other words, the PA is required to maintain friendly relations with the Jewish state. It's not an option. It's an obligation. And praising athletes for boycotting Israelis is a violation of that obligation. It's the exact opposite of friendly relations.

But note the date that the fencing incident was reported: Oct. 11, 2022. That was three weeks before the recent Israeli election. So, nobody can blame the PA's action on Benjamin Netanyahu or Itamar Ben-Gvir, or the Israeli election results in general. This burst of PA anti-normalization hostility took place when Israel was governed by Yair Lapid and his left-wing coalition partners.

This raises two interesting questions. First, why is the Jewish Left, in Israel and the United States, silent about being slapped in the face this way? Second, why weren't they bothered that the PA was trying to incite athletes against Israel's left-of-center government?

Remember, for years, the Jewish Left has been telling us that the Palestinian Arabs have become moderate and are finally ready to live in peace with Israel. Normalization of cultural relations, including athletic competitions, are the very essence of peaceful coexistence. If Labor and Meretz and J Street and Americans for Peace Now really want to have genuine peace with the Palestinian Arabs, they should be shouting from the rooftops in protest over the fencing incident.

Why have they remained silent? Because sad to say, the Jewish left's old dream of peace has been replaced by a new strategy of surrender. They know that normalization is a sham. They know that the PA constantly violates every article of the Oslo agreements. But they don't care. They simply want Israel to surrender to the Arabs' demand for every inch of Judea, Samaria, and much of Jerusalem. Surrender has almost become a kind of religion for them.

It's also worth asking: What does the fencing incident tell us about the PA's intentions? The answer is that it demonstrates, once again, that any agreement signed by the Palestinian Arab leadership is not worth the paper it's printed on.

The PA promises peace; then it wages war. The PA promises to combat terrorists; then it shelters and funds terrorists. The PA promises normalization; then it incites boycotts of Israel. It doesn't matter if the Israeli government is left-of-center or right-of-center because the PA remains true to its unwavering goal of eliminating Israel altogether. And even something as seemingly trivial as the fencing incident illustrates that cold, hard truth once again.

 Reprinted with permission from JNS.org.

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Imagine if the ruling party of any country announced that it had begun carrying out terrorist attacks. Imagine the shock and horror if the UK Conservative Party, Canada's Liberal Party or the US Democratic Party made such a declaration. Yet that is exactly what Fatah, the ruling party of the Palestinian Authority, just did—and the international community is silent.

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After the killing of an IDF officer near the city of Jenin in Judea/Samaria on Sept. 14, the official Fatah Facebook page featured a video praising the murder. A translation by Palestinian Media Watch states that the video referred to the Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades organization as Fatah's "military arm." It further declared that Fatah "takes responsibility for the operations of its military arm" and that the Brigades "is officially announcing" that it will be carrying out additional "operations."

Nobody had ever heard of the Brigades until the autumn of 2000, when the Palestinian Arabs launched what they called the second intifada. That campaign of terrorism was led by what was described by the media as a "new" group called the Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades.

But it was obvious that a terrorist group couldn't spring up fully formed overnight, with an entire network of highly trained bombers and shooters already in place. And it didn't. The Brigades was a front group constructed by Fatah in order to continue the violence the party had promised, in the Oslo Accords, to give up.

The most notorious of the attacks by the Brigades were a Jan. 2002 assault on a bat mitzvah celebration in Hadera that killed six and wounded 33; a March 2002 suicide bombing in front of Jerusalem's Yeshivat Beit Yisrael that killed 11 (including two infants) and wounded more than 50; and a suicide bombing at the Tel Aviv central bus station in January 2003 that killed 23 and wounded more than 100.

In March 2002, the State Department added the Brigades to the official US list of terror groups, but refused to acknowledge that the organization was a front group for Fatah. The reason was strictly political—admitting that Fatah is a terrorist movement would have made it impossible for the US to keep giving money to the PA.

Yet over the years, the evidence that the Brigades is part of Fatah has mounted. In Nov. 2003, a team of investigative journalists from the BBC revealed that Fatah allocated $50,000 a month to the Brigades. A June 2005 study by the US government's own Congressional Research Service reported: "On December 18, 2003, Fatah asked the leaders of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades to join the Fatah Council, recognizing it officially as part of the Fatah organization."

Palestinian leaders themselves have sometimes admitted the truth. In June 2004, then-PA Prime Minister Ahmed Qurei declared in an interview with the London-based Asharq al-Awsat newspaper, "We have clearly declared that the Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades are part of Fatah. We are committed to them and Fatah bears full responsibility for the group."

Some in the media remain in denial. Articles in The New York Times, for example, have described the Brigades as "an armed group loosely linked to Fatah." But others in the media don't resort to such slippery language. The official BBC News profile of the Brigades states, "The Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades is an armed Palestinian group associated with Yasser Arafat's Fatah organization." National Public Radio has described the group as "Fatah's armed militant wing, the Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades."

Moreover, a Council on Foreign Relations report on the Brigades found that it is "aligned with Fatah" and "affiliated with former Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat's Fatah faction."

This week's proclamation on the Fatah Facebook page hammers the final nail in the coffin of the myth of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades. No reasonable person can pretend that the Brigades is separate from Fatah any longer. The truth has been revealed by Fatah itself. It is now time for the Biden administration to take the next step and put Fatah on the official US list of terrorist groups.

Reprinted with permission from JNS.org.

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The families of the Israeli athletes massacred at the 1972 Munich Olympics have announced a boycott of an upcoming 50th-anniversary commemoration in Germany. They're protesting the inadequate level of compensation provided by the German government, and I fully support their position.

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But let's not forget that one of the masterminds of the massacre heads a regime that is currently receiving hundreds of millions of dollars in direct and indirect aid each year from the United States, Germany and numerous other countries.

I am referring to Mahmoud Abbas, the chairman of both the Palestinian Authority and its main faction, Fatah.

The autobiography of the late Mohammed Oudeh, better known as Abu Daoud, named Abbas as one of the three senior officials of Fatah who assisted Daoud in planning the Munich massacre.

Officially, the Munich attack was carried out by the "Black September" group that pretended to be independent of Fatah.

But the myth of an "independent" Black September was shattered many years ago with the declassifying of a telegram sent by the US State Department to American embassies around the world on March 13, 1973.

The text of the telegram is widely available on the Internet. It reveals the harsh truth about the Munich murderers. You can see it here:

"Question of link between Black September Organization (BSO) and Fatah has been subject of much public discussion," the telegram begins. Then it explains Arafat's lies about his role in Black September: "Fatah leader Arafat has disavowed connection with BSO. … Arafat continues to disavow publicly any connection between Fatah and terrorist operations. Similarly, Fatah maintains its pretense of moderation … ."

The truth about Black September and Fatah was exactly the opposite of what Arafat claimed, according to the US State Department telegram: "USG [United States Government [has information that Fatah is in fact parent body of BSO. … The Black September Organization is a cover term for Fatah's terrorist operations executed by Fatah's intelligence organization. … For all intents and purposes no significant distinction now can be made between the BSO and Fatah."

So "Black September" was a fiction − so says our own State Department. Fatah, under the leadership of Arafat and Abbas, was the "parent body" of Black September. Meaning that Fatah was responsible for the Munich massacre.

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And yet countries around the world, led by the United States, are lining up to give Abbas astronomical sums of money. The Biden administration is currently providing the Palestinian Arabs with more than $500 million annually.

Germany sent the Palestinian Arabs $199 million last year. Norway is giving $95 million, Switzerland $43 million, Great Britain $26 million and Japan $25 million. There are many more millions coming from other countries as well.

The fact that some of the money is provided indirectly, through various UN agencies and other third parties, is just a technicality. Such funding is fungible. It frees up the P.A. from having to pay for services and goods that it would otherwise have to pay for.

It is often forgotten that one of the Israeli athletes who was murdered at the Munich Olympics was Cleveland native David Berger, a dual American-Israeli citizen. That makes it even more outrageous that American taxpayers are underwriting a regime headed by one of the terrorists responsible for the murder of an American citizen.

By all means, let's insist that the German government pay appropriate compensation to the families of the victims. But let's not lose sight of the incredibly hypocrisy of governments that shed crocodile tears over the Munich massacre, and then send hundreds of millions of dollars to a man who helped perpetrate it.

Reprinted with permission from JNS.org.

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The bullet that the Palestinian Authority handed over to US officials may or may not have been the one that killed Al Jazeera reporter Shireen Abu Akleh in Jenin in May.

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The bullet may or have been too damaged to determine conclusively whose gun it came from.

The bullet may or may not have been fired by an Israeli soldier.

All that matters is who bears responsibility – legal and moral responsibility – for Akleh's death. And it has been indisputably clear from day one who the guilty parties are: the Palestinian Arab terrorists who initiated the gun battle that resulted in her death and the Palestinian Authority that coddles and shelters those terrorists.

Remember these facts: Jenin has been governed solely by the PA since 1995. There are no Israeli settlers there. No Israeli governor. No Israeli military administration. The only reason Israeli troops briefly entered Jenin on that fatal day was that they were chasing terrorists the PA had refused to arrest.

In blatant violation of the Oslo accords, the PA allows terrorist cells from Hamas, Fatah, and Palestinian Islamic Jihad (the gang that murdered my daughter, Alisa) to operate freely in Jenin.

According to the Oslo agreement, the PA is required to disband all terrorist groups, seize their weapons and outlaw them – in other words, to put them out of business. But they never did it.

The PA never outlawed terrorist groups. It has never made a serious effort to arrest their members or confiscate their weapons in Jenin or anywhere else. It could crush the terrorist groups if it wanted to: The PA has one of the largest per-capita security forces in the world. But it just doesn't want to. It treats terrorists in Jenin and other areas under its control like brothers, not enemies.

Even sources that are unsympathetic to Israel occasionally admit that terrorists roam free in PA cities. On March 23, 2014, for example, The New York Times reported that Israeli troops were forced to enter the Jenin refugee camp in pursuit of terrorists because although Jenin is under the "full control" of the PA, "the Palestinian [security forces] did not generally operate in refugee camps."

That is why those Israeli soldiers went into Jenin; the PA, by its deliberation policy of inaction, forced them to do it. The Israelis could not halt their pursuit when the fleeing terrorists reached Jenin; that would have left the terrorists free to murder more Jewish women and children. The Israeli soldiers had to chase them. It was their moral and legal obligation, even if it meant briefly entering a PA-run city.

That makes the PA partly responsible for the death of Shireen Abu Akleh.

The terrorists were the ones who were directly responsible for causing the specific circumstances that led to her death. When confronted by Israeli soldiers, they could have surrendered.

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It's just like when a criminal is confronted by police officers in the United States. The criminal has a choice. He or she can surrender peacefully, or they can start shooting. If an innocent bystander is killed in the shooting – whether the fatal bullet is fired by the criminal or the police – it is the criminal who caused it. The police would not have shot their guns if the criminal had peacefully surrendered.

Likewise in Jenin. The only reason Israelis were shooting was that the terrorists were shooting at them. Obviously, the Israelis weren't aiming their guns at reporters in the vicinity. Israeli soldiers have never deliberately shot at journalists.

If the particular bullet that killed Abu Akleh came from a Palestinian terrorist's gun, then the terrorists are to blame. And if the bullet came from Israeli soldiers who were responding to the terrorists' gunfire, then the terrorists are to blame. Either way, the origin of the much-ballyhooed bullet really doesn't matter at all.

Reprinted with permission from JNS.org.

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The "West Bank" is "occupied" by Israel. Wait, no, only part of it is.

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The Palestinian Arabs are "stateless." Wait, no, a large segment of the region actually is "governed by the Palestinian Authority."

These and other contradictory statements all appeared in a single article in The New York Times on April 17 by news correspondent Raja Abdulrahim. I almost feel sorry for her; she seems so confused.

It's not, however, a confusion based on facts that are perplexing or unclear. It's based on the blatant contradictions between the actual situation in Israel and the version that the Times wants its readers to believe.

Abdulrahim is a new addition to the Jerusalem bureau of the newspaper. Pro-Israel groups such as CAMERA have previously documented Abdulrahim's long record of bias, going all the way back to her days as a journalism student at the University of Florida.

But it would be a mistake to assume that she is somehow more biased or more extreme than her colleagues in the Jerusalem bureau. It's obvious from their reporting – long before Abdulrahim arrived – that they all share the same goal: bringing about an Israeli return to the nine-miles-wide pre-1967 borders.

Promoting that narrative requires claiming that "the West Bank" is "occupied" by Israel, as the April 17 article asserted in its opening sentences. The only way to advance the idea that Israel must retreat is to claim that Israel is "occupying" the entire area.

The problem, of course, is that the idea of an "occupied West Bank" is a myth. So the phrase works only in a short article where there's no room to go into details. In a long piece, such as Abdulrahim's story on April 17, there's no alternative but to go into more detail. And that's where her trouble began.

Way down in paragraph 11, when she is about to explain how Israel sends its troops into Arab cities such as Jenin in pursuit of terrorists, Abdulrahim is forced to reposition herself with this gem of an oxymoron: "Israel has occupied the West Bank since 1967 and controls over 60 percent of its territory."

Huh? If Israel "occupies" it, then why doesn't it "control" the whole thing? Five paragraphs later, Abdulrahim reluctantly supplies the answer: The other 40% is "governed by the Palestinian Authority." Whoops! So much for the "occupation."

A word about Abdulrahim's interesting use of the term "over 60%." If the number is 65% or 70% or 75%, why not say so? Why use the vague phrase "over 60"? Because the actual number is 60.5. That's right; it's literally the lowest possible number that can qualify for the term "over 60." But Abdulrahim didn't want it to sound like it is, essentially, 60. That wouldn't make Israel look sufficiently tyrannical. So she uses "over 60," hoping that readers will think it's much more.

Elsewhere in the article, Abdulrahim calls the Palestinian Arabs "stateless," another example of journalistic sleight-of-hand. Yes, technically the Palestinian Authority is not a sovereign state. But in reality, the PA-controlled region has virtually every attribute of statehood except the right to import tanks and planes.

The issue for Abdulrahim is that she wants readers to sympathize with the Palestinian Arabs and to hate Israel. Calling them "stateless" makes them sound pitiful and oppressed, and makes Israel seem cruel for keeping them in that situation.

Most of Abdulrahim's article focuses on the occasional entrance of Israeli troops into PA cities in order to arrest terrorists (although she calls them "attackers" and "militants," never terrorists). She calls Israel's actions "aggressive" and repeatedly quotes various people accusing Israel of "collective punishment."

What she conveniently omits is the fact that the Palestinian Arab leadership (Yasser Arafat, Mahmoud Abbas, et al) agreed to such Israeli actions, in writing, in the Oslo accords. There is nothing "aggressive" or inappropriate or illegal about Israeli troops chasing and apprehending terrorists. And it goes without saying that if the PA security forces would arrest them, then the Israeli security forces wouldn't have to.

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Moreover, the very fact that Israeli troops come from elsewhere in the region in order to briefly enter PA cities demonstrates that the Israeli troops are not stationed in those cities – because there is no "occupation." The Israeli "occupation" of the Palestinian Arabs ended in 1995 when Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin withdrew Israel's forces from the cities where 98% of the Palestinian Arabs reside and turned them over to the PA

But, of course, Raja Abdulrahim and her colleagues at the Times never mention those facts. I suppose that would be too confusing for their readers.

Stephen M. Flatow, an attorney in New Jersey, is the father of Alisa Flatow, who was murdered in an Iranian-sponsored Palestinian terrorist attack in 1995. His book, "A Father's Story: My Fight for Justice Against Iranian Terror," has just been published.

Reprinted with permission from JNS.org.

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With news of war in Ukraine grabbing all the headlines, Palestinian Arab officials and advocates are straining to find comparisons between the Ukraine-Russian crisis and their own cause. There are indeed some comparisons, though not the ones they have in mind.

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PLO official Nihad Abu Ghosh sees an analogy between the collapse of the Soviet Union (in 1991) and the Ukraine crisis − in both situations, he complains, Israel is taking advantage of the situation in order "to increase settlement building in the occupied West Bank by promoting immigration."

Abu Ghosh, it should be noted, is a longtime official of the PLO as well as head of information and education for the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine, a PLO member organization. Over the years, he has served as head of diaspora affairs for the PLO, and head of information and education for the DFLP.

That's important because it was the PLO that signed the Oslo accords with Israel in 1993; the Palestinian Authority had not yet been established. The Oslo accords do not prohibit Israel from building new towns in the Israeli-controlled portion of Judea and Samaria. Nor do the accords bar Israel from allowing Ukrainian Jews, or anybody else, to settle in those towns.

In other words, Abu Ghosh is complaining about something that is permitted by the agreements his own organization signed and is bound by. Indeed, any PLO or PA official who protests against more Jews becoming residents of Israeli-controlled territories is protesting against something that the PLO and PA leadership already agreed to.

So why do PA officials − and advocates of the Palestinian Arab cause in general − keep complaining about "illegal Jewish settlements"? Because they know they can get away with it. No reporter ever asks them, "But don't the Oslo accords permit Jewish settlements in Israel's territories?" No editor ever fact-checks them or corrects them before publishing their op-eds about "illegal settlers."

Another Ukraine-Palestinians analogy currently making the rounds has to do with the suffering of civilians. This allegation gained currency in social media this week, courtesy of international supermodel Gigi Hadid, who announced that she is donating all her earnings "from the fall 2022 shows" to "aid those suffering from the war in Ukraine" and "those experiencing the same in Palestine."

Let's leave aside, for the moment, the hypocrisy of the PA or Hamas accepting donations from the earnings of a model whose outfits flagrantly violate the Islamic strictures that are the law in both the PA territories and the Hamas-run Gaza Strip. The PA's constitution says "Islam is the official religion in Palestine" and that "the principles of Islamic Sharia [law] will be the main source of legislation." The garb promoted or imposed upon women under the PA and Hamas differs quite noticeably from that which is worn by Hadid on the runway.

Instead, let's focus on Hadid's analogy. "Hands off Ukraine, Hands off Palestine," she tweeted, and supporters of the Palestinian Arab cause everywhere surely are nodding their heads in agreement.

For decades, the Arab regimes surrounding Israel have been supporting the violent Palestinian Arab terrorist-separatists in Judea, Samaria and Gaza − just like Russia has been supporting the terrorist-separatists in the Donetsk and Lugansk regions of eastern Ukraine. The Arab regimes have periodically launched wars against Israel based on the pretext of the "suffering" of those separatists − again, just like Russia's war against Ukraine.

The Arabs, like the Russians, are the aggressors, trying to take over a country that belongs to somebody else. Israel, like Ukraine, is an embattled democracy with deep roots in their land.

As for the suffering of innocent civilians − again, there's a valid comparison, just not the one that Gigi Hadid or Nihad Abu Ghosh have in mind. The repeated Arab invasions of Israel have claimed the lives of thousands of Israeli civilians. The daily attempts by Palestinian Arab terrorists to shoot, stab or stone Jews to death cause constant suffering to Israeli civilians. I wonder when Hadid will donate some portion of her earnings to alleviate their suffering.

So, by all means, let's examine the Ukraine crisis for comparisons to Israel, even if what we find proves uncomfortable for PA.spokesmen, pro-Palestinian cultural celebrities or other advocates of the Palestinian cause.

Reprinted with permission from JNS.org.

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"Free Palestine!" says actress Emma Watson.

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She's right.

The territories where the Palestinian Arabs live are indeed enslaved. They deserve to be freed from the tyrannical rule of their oppressors – Hamas and the Palestinian Authority.

The actress, best known for her role as Hermione Granger in the "Harry Potter" films, set off a firestorm in the world of social media this week with her Instagram post showing "Free Palestine!" banners and expressing "solidarity" with them. Hopefully, her declaration will stimulate a serious conversation about the cruel occupation that the international community has been ignoring.

The details concerning Hamas and the PA, which I cite here, are all quoted from the latest reports by two strongly pro-Palestinian groups: Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch. These are not "Israeli allegations." They are what the Palestinian Arabs' most vocal supporters are saying about the two Arab regimes that rule over 98% of the Palestinian Arabs.

During the past year, "the Palestinian authorities in the West Bank and the Hamas de facto administration in the Gaza Strip continued to crack down on dissent, including by stifling freedoms of expression and assembly, attacking journalists and detaining opponents," reports Amnesty.

Human Rights Watch notes that the PA recently jailed journalist Sami al-Sai for the crime of "administering a Facebook page that had posted information about PA corruption." Twenty protesters in Ramallah who dared to cry out against PA corruption were likewise jailed. Hamas recently arrested seven citizens for "participating in a video chat where they answered questions from Israeli civilians about life in Gaza." And other Gazans were jailed for "weakening the revolutionary spirit."

Hamas also frequently executes citizens after "trials" that are "marred with due process violations," reports Human Rights Watch.

How do the PA and Hamas regimes treat those whom it arrests? "Palestinian security forces in the West Bank and Gaza routinely used torture and other ill-treatment with impunity. … Security forces in both areas used unnecessary and/or excessive force during law enforcement activities."

What about women's rights in Occupied Palestine? Amnesty: "Women and girls faced discrimination in law and practice and were inadequately protected against sexual and other gender-based violence, including so-called honour killings." Last year alone, "nineteen women died in the West Bank and 18 in Gaza as a result of gender-based violence."

Human Rights Watch points out that the PA "has no comprehensive domestic violence law." Keep in mind that the PA has been ruling for 27 years. Nearly three decades in power and still no comprehensive domestic violence law.

With regard to gay rights, Amnesty reports: "Lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex people continued to face discrimination and lacked protection" at the hands of Hamas and the PA In Gaza, section 152 of the penal code "criminalizes consensual same-sex sexual activity and makes it punishable by up to 10 years' imprisonment."

Citing local Palestinian Arab human-rights activists, Amnesty says that in the past year, there were numerous "violations of freedom of expression, freedom of assembly and freedom of the press," as well as "158 cases in the West Bank and 118 in Gaza of the arbitrary arrests of opponents and critics."

Amnesty says that last year, the Palestinian Centre for Development and Media Freedoms "recorded 97 incidents of attacks against journalists, including arbitrary arrests, ill-treatment during interrogation, confiscation of equipment, physical assaults and bans on reporting: 36 in the West Bank and 61 in Gaza."

As for elections, PA leader Mahmoud Abbas is now in the 17th year of his four year-term and has repeatedly postponed parliamentary elections. In Gaza, too, democracy is a dirty word.

I realize that Emma Watson is an actress, not an expert on Middle East affairs. And in posting about "Palestine," she might have just been going along with what she thinks all the cool young celebrities are doing.

But perhaps the international uproar that she has provoked will inspire her to take a closer look at the implications of what she posted on Instagram. Because in raising the issue of freeing the Palestinian Arabs from their real occupiers, she's actually on to something.

Reprinted with permission from JNS.org.

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The post Emma Watson is right about Palestinians being enslaved appeared first on www.israelhayom.com.

There are some pretty nutty conspiracy theories about COVID-19 going around these days. The nuttiest ones are coming from Palestinian Arab leaders. When you hear the details of what they're claiming, it's tempting to laugh. But these conspiracy theories are no laughing matter – in fact, the ramifications could be deadly.

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The latest comes from the pen of Muwaffaq Matar, a regular columnist for the official Palestinian Authority daily newspaper, Al-Hayat Al-Jadida. "The racist occupation government has worked to export the Covid-19 epidemic to us, after our institutions succeeded in limiting and reducing the scope of its spread," Matar wrote. "[Israel] used the virus as a new weapon to weaken the scope of economic life to the lowest point, and to leave it in an almost fateful dependency on its economy!" (Translation courtesy of Palestinian Media Watch.)

If one isolated lunatic wrote those words, there would be no reason to take him seriously. But the publication of that conspiracy theory in the official PA newspaper means that it reflects the views of the PA leadership. And it means that this is what the PA wants the Palestinian Arab public to believe.

Meanwhile, Mahmoud al-Habbash, adviser on religious affairs to PA chief Mahmoud Abbas, has offered his own crazy conspiracy theory regarding COVID-19. According to al-Habbash, all of the problems in the world today, from coronavirus to inflation, are divine punishment for "the injustice directed against [the Palestinian Arabs]…Our land was stolen, our people were expelled, our holy sites were desecrated, and not only is the entire world silent facing the oppressors but they are also blaming the victim."

"The punishment that is befalling all of humanity – the rise in prices, economic collapse, epidemics, climate change, global warming – everything that is happening in the universe is because of the injustice," al-Habbash declared.

Again, if these were the ravings of some kook in an insane asylum, we would pay no attention. But they are the views of a senior PA government official– and they were broadcast on official PA Television, on Nov. 26. Al-Habbash was saying what his fellow PA leaders believe, and what they want all Palestinian Arabs to believe.

Joining Muwaffaq Matar and Mahmoud al-Habbash in the crazy corner is Sheikh Issam Amira, the official imam of the Al Aqsa Mosque, on Jerusalem's Temple Mount. According to The Jerusalem Post, Amira presented his own foaming-at-the-mouth twist on the COVID-19 conspiracy theories in a recent sermon in the Al-Aqsa Mosque.

"Why has this abomination spread? Why has coronavirus – with its Indian variant and its Omicron variant – spread?" the imam asked. "What are these names, these diseases, that were not known to our forefathers?"

His answer: "The reason is clear …. It is the infidel and licentious media [and] rulers who permit and promote homosexuality [and] the rulers who follow the feminist organizations….These are all the precursors of the spread of diseases which did not exist among our forefathers."

Of course, the PA leadership's COVID-19 conspiracy theories are just the tip of the iceberg. Anybody who has followed the pronouncements of PA government officials knows that the list of wild (and often anti-Semitic) conspiracy theories is almost endless. Here is a small sampling of what PA leaders and their official publications have claimed in recent years:

• The Holocaust was fabricated by Jews (in order to gain international sympathy).
• The Protocols of the Elders of Zion are an authentic expose of the Jewish plot to rule the world.
• Israeli rabbis teach Jewish children to kill all non-Jews.
• Israel poisons the air in the PA-controlled territories (in order to reduce the population there).
• Israel feeds Arab children candy laced with a chemical that makes them infertile.
• Israel causes earthquakes in PA territory.
• Israel and/or the US carried out the 9/11 attacks (in order to justify invading Muslim countries).

The reason this insanity matters is that if a Palestinian Arab state is created next to Israel, its leadership, public opinion and popular culture will be saturated with these beliefs.

Countries can peacefully coexist side by side without agreeing on everything. They can have widely differing views on all sorts of political, religious and social issues. But they do have to agree on a few basic things, like what constitutes aggression and what constitutes self-defense. Or whether the Earth is round or flat. Because if one of the countries isn't governed by rational, sane people, then you can expect that they will do irrational and insane things.

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Nobody wants to live next door to a country governed by insane people. Czechoslovakia learned that the hard way in 1938. Same for Poland, in 1939, and France, in 1940.

Everything Palestinian Arab leaders say illustrates that they do not have a firm grip on reality, to put it mildly. They live in a kind of mental alternate universe, where they sincerely believe nutty things and make their policies accordingly. Giving such people a sovereign state – and reducing Israel to nine miles wide in order to make room for it – would be the height of folly.

Reprinted with permission from JNS.org.

The post Palestinian COVID conspiracy theories do matter appeared first on www.israelhayom.com.