No Difference Between Hamas and Fatah - by Khaled Abu Toameh -
Has Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas changed his position toward his rivals in Hamas? This is the question that some Palestinians have been asking in the wake of Abbas's opposition to a US-sponsored draft resolution that asks the United Nations General Assembly to condemn Hamas for repeatedly firing rockets at Israel and instigating violence.
Abbas's hatred of Hamas is far from secret. For years - and until today - Abbas has used every available platform to launch scathing attacks on Hamas.
He accused Hamas of foiling Arab efforts to end the dispute with his ruling Fatah faction.
He accused Hamas of masterminding a series of explosions targeting the homes of some of his senior Fatah officials in the Gaza Strip.
He accused Hamas of staging a coup in 2007 against his Palestinian Authority (PA) in the Gaza Strip and seeking to establish a separate Palestinian there.
He accused Hamas of standing behind the botched assassination attempt on his prime minister, Rami Hamdallah, in the Gaza Strip earlier this year. He even made a metaphoric remark that, "shoes will be pouring on the heads of Hamas leaders."
In his last speech at the UN General Assembly, Abbas repeated his charges against Hamas and threatened to impose new punitive measures against the Gaza Strip unless Hamas allows his government to assume full control over the Hamas-ruled coastal enclave.
In the past few days, however, the rhetoric of Abbas and his senior officials in Ramallah toward Hamas has made a 180 degree turn. What is behind this sudden change? Has Abbas discovered that he was mistaken about Hamas all these years and that its leaders, Ismail Haniyeh, Mahmoud Zahar and Yeyha Sinwar are actually his good buddies?
The US-sponsored UN draft resolution condemning Hamas seems to have brought Hamas and Fatah closer to each other. Just last week, it seemed that Egyptian efforts to end the Hamas-Fatah rivalry had once again belly-flopped.
The Palestinian Authority and Fatah are strongly opposed to all the policies of the US administration. They have already rejected US President Donald Trump's yet-to-be-announced plan for peace in the Middle East, widely known as the "deal of the century." They have rejected Trump's decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel's capital. They have rejected and condemned Trump's transfer of the US Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. They have rejected and condemned Trump's decision to cut financial aid to the PA and UNRWA.
Now, in line with their refusal to accept anything that emerges from the Trump administration, the Palestinian Authority and Fatah have also found themselves in the awkward position of needing to reject and denounce the US initiative to condemn Hamas for firing rockets at Israel.
It is supposedly fine for Abbas and his officials to condemn Hamas on a daily basis. It is supposedly not fine, however, for the US administration to condemn Hamas for its terrorist attacks against Israel. This is the logic of the Palestinian Authority, which has also been imposing financial and economic sanctions on the Gaza Strip in the past year. The sanctions include, among other things, the suspension of salaries to thousands of civil servants, cutting financial aid to needy families in the Gaza Strip, and refusing to pay for fuel and electricity supplied by Israel to the residents living under Hamas.
Abbas and Hamas have been working separately to thwart the US draft resolution at the UN General Assembly. Abbas has instructed his envoy to the UN to make an effort to foil the anti-Hamas resolution, while Hamas leaders have been urging Arab and Muslim leaders and governments to help thwart the US initiative.
"Despite all our differences with Hamas, we are categorically opposed to the American and Israeli attempt to label Hamas a terrorist group," explained Osama Qawassmeh, a senior Fatah official. We will fight to thwart the US resolution."
Another senior Fatah official, Abbas Zaki, was even more adamant in his defense of Hamas. "Hamas belongs to us and we belong to Hamas," he said. "If Hamas, which is practicing resistance, is considered a terrorist organization, this would mean that all Palestinians are practicing terrorism. Hamas, like all Palestinian factions, is a national liberation movement."
Abbas and Fatah are defending Hamas not out of love for Hamas, but because they despise the Trump administration to the extent that they are willing to go to bat for their arch-rivals in Hamas. Judging from the statements of some of Abbas's top officials, it is nevertheless clear that they fear that a condemnation of Hamas would pave the way for similar moves against other Palestinian factions, including the Palestinian president's own Fatah.
As Palestinian political analyst Emad Omar put it, "The proposed US resolution is harmful to the Palestinians' right of resistance. As president of the Palestinians, Abbas is forced to defend Hamas and any other Palestinian faction."
Hamas, for its part, has expressed gratitude to Abbas and Fatah for their strong opposition to the US-sponsored draft resolution.
Does all this mean that Fatah and Hamas have agreed to patch up their differences and open a new page in their relations? The answer, of course, is no. This is obviously a short-lived honeymoon that will end the day after the UN General Assembly vote on the anti-Hamas resolution. Abbas wants to score points on the Palestinian street by showing that he is capable of challenging the US administration at the UN. For now, Abbas is prepared to swallow the bitter pill of defending Hamas. The morning after the vote, Abbas will wake up to the realization that Hamas was a strange bedfellow indeed.
A Whole Country Of Marc Lamont Hills - By Stephen Flatow -
CNN has fired commentator Marc Lamont Hill for giving a speech in which he called for a "free Palestine from the river to the sea." In other words, he means the destruction of Israel.
But let's not forget about a much bigger problem: an entire generation of Palestinian Arabs who want to create "Palestine, from the river to the sea."
The Palestinian Authority has posted a deeply disturbing photo on the official Facebook page of the P.A. Presidential Guard. It shows an Arab boy who looks to be 5 or 6 years old, holding a Palestinian flag and flashing a V sign.
That's not the peace sign that antiwar protesters used to make during the Vietnam war. In Palestinian culture, it's the "V-for-victory" sign. As in, victory over Israel.
Behind the boy is a huge map, twice his size, labeled "Palestine." Now if the Palestinian Authority was really interested only in a state along the 1967 lines--as J Street and other pro-Palestinian apologists claim--then presumably the P.A.'s map of "Palestine" would reflect that.
No such luck. The map of "Palestine" covers all of Israel. All of it.
And just so there is no doubt about the P.A.'s goal, various cities are named on the map. They include numerous cities within pre-1967 Israel, such as Haifa, Tiberias, Beersheva and Ashkelon. The entire Negev Desert is included as part of "Palestine." Tel Aviv is, too--labeled with the Arabic name "Tal Al-Rabia."
The entire Facebook image is titled "Palestine We Will Surely Return." That is the "Palestine" to which they want to return: from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea, Haifa and Tel Aviv, and all the rest.
Palestinian children are not born hating Jews or dreaming of destroying Israel. It takes an entire village, an entire society, an entire governing regime to make them that way.
In the schools where they are educated, as part of the television programs they watch and regarding so many other facets of their culture, Palestinian Arab children are taught that Jews are evil, that murderers of Jews are heroes and martyrs, and that the Jewish state must be replaced from the river to the sea.
This message is drummed home even in the games they play. In their summer camps, they are entertained with war (against Israel) games. They perform skits about kidnapping and murdering Jews.
An official P.A. spokesman recently characterized the wave of flaming-kite attacks from Gaza as "a children's game such as kites, used by peaceful protesters as one of the means of protest against the siege and the occupation." These youngsters are taught that attempting to burn Jews to death, and setting their houses and fields on fire, is indeed a "game." That's their idea of fun.
When those children reach young adulthood and go off to college, the message of hate continues. Palestinian Media Watch recently posted a video of a speech by Saleh Abu Osba, the rector of Al-Istiqlal University, in P.A.-occupied Jericho.
"We the Palestinians have a great dream before us," he declared. "To liberate Palestine from the river to the sea. This dream will remain before us and requires of us will power. Our people's will power is strong. The proof of this is the thousands of prisoners and the thousands of martyrs who have fallen to realize the dream of liberating Palestine."
Mr. Osba is not some isolated extremist. He isn't some lone, rogue faculty member. He is the rector of the university. He is the voice of a P.A. institution of higher learning. His job is to help educate an entire generation of young Palestinian Arabs.
Just to make sure that Osba's message was heard far beyond the walls of his campus, the P.A. broadcast his speech on the official "Voice of Palestine" radio station.
The child posing in front of that "From the river to the sea" map on the P.A.'s Facebook page may well grow up to imitate the Palestinian teenager who butchered Mrs. Dafna Meir with a 20-centimeter knife in front of her children; or the Palestinian teenage firebomb-throwers who severely burned 11-year-old Ayelet Shapiro near Ma'ale Shomron, nearly killing her and leaving her deeply scarred for the rest of her life.
And if that Palestinian poster child does carry out such a bloody deed, he will be hailed as a hero by his family, friends and community--and showered with rewards by the P.A. If he ends up in an Israeli prison, he'll receive a generous salary for life from the P.A. If he is killed during the attack, his family will receive those P.A. checks. Schools will be named after him. Soccer tournaments as well.
So yes, I'm just as bothered as everyone else when Marc Lamont Hill talks about "liberating Palestine from the river to the sea." But I am even more worried about the entire generation of children who are being raised to pursue that goal, and the legion of cheerleaders and apologists who want to give them a state in Israel's backyard--a state that will be the launching pad for the fulfillment of their evil dream.
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