Abbas' advisor attacks US, Israel in sermon on US Jerusalem recognition, denies Jewish history, fabricates ancient Palestinian history there
Official PA TV, Friday sermon by Supreme Shari’ah Judge, PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas’ advisor on Religious and Islamic Affairs, and Chairman of the Supreme Council for Shari'ah Justice Mahmoud Al-Habbash at the Mausoleum Mosque near former PLO and PA Chairman Yasser Arafat’s grave in Ramallah
Supreme Shari’ah Judge, PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas’ advisor on Religious and Islamic Affairs, and Chairman of the Supreme Council for Shari'ah Justice Mahmoud Al-Habbash: "Yesterday you saw, brothers, how the world returned a slap to American President [Trump], how the entire world that the American president had threatened, stuck its tongue out at him and said: 'We are not bought with your dollars, and we are not bought with your aid. From the outset, you did not give us aid because of our beautiful eyes. You aid us for your own interest, and out of your own interests and calculations. So stop this aid! (Click to view video)
Unfortunately, [the US] chose to stand alongside the oppressor, chose of its own will to stand alongside the oppressor and the aggression. It chose to stand alongside the hostility to the Muslims and the Muslim religion, and to the Christians and the Christian religion. The American position towards Jerusalem harmed not only the Muslims throughout the world, but also harmed the Christians, the heart of the Christian faith, as Jerusalem is from their perspective holy land, and a holy city…
The false claim that it is Israel’s capital, even though it does not change anything in reality, … damages first of all the image of the US, and its interests. In the [UN] Security Council, America stood alone against the entire world that said to it: ‘You made a mistake,’ and it is insisting on the mistake.
By the way, they know that they are mistaken. They know that Jerusalem is only ours, only ours. They [the Americans] know it. It is a strange thing that a state that is only a little older than 200 years. takes a stand toward a city that is 5,000 years old. Where was America when Jerusalem was built, that it should decide whose capital it is? And where was Israel when Jerusalem was built? Jerusalem was here before America and before Israel and before Europe and before this entire world. We were in Jerusalem more than 5,000 years ago, and we have not left it. There was no period in history when Jerusalem was empty of its people, and we are its people. (Click to view video) Generations and periods pass over Jerusalem, and we still remain in it. We did not leave it.
Many nations have passed through it, and then they left because they have no bond to it. The Romans came, and before them the Byzantine Greeks, and the Persians came, …and the Crusaders came – and they all left because it is not their city, because it is not theirs. No one leaves their homeland. If it was their homeland, they would not have left it. They would not have left it of their own will. Because they are only looking for interests.
And even if we assume that the version that says – we'll assume – the version that says that the Israelis or Jews came and lived in Jerusalem – even if this was correct – how long did they live there? 70 years? 80 years? Their version says 74 years (sic., Jewish tradition holds it was the Jewish capital for hundreds of years). Afterwards they left (sic., were exiled). Where they found a homeland, they dwell there and live there, because the city [of Jerusalem] is not theirs. While we, since we built it, since the Canaanite Arabs (sic., they were not Arabs) who came from the Arabian Peninsula built it and called it by different names - Jebus, Or Salem, or Aelia [Capitolina] (i.e., the Roman colony built over Jerusalem), and more - since we built it, or our forefathers built it, we have not left it, because it is our capital - because it is our capital and our country and our city. Whereas America, which - as they say - was born yesterday, wants to decide the fate of a city whose age is greater than history, this is what we say out of religious faith.
‘“O Allah's Messenger! Which mosque was first built on the surface of the earth?” He said, “Al- Masjid-ul-Haram (in Mecca) (i.e., the Great Mosque of Mecca).” I said, “Which was built next?” He replied “The mosque of Al-Aqsa (in Jerusalem).” I said, “What was the period of construction between the two?” He said, “Forty years”’ [Sahih Bukhari 3366, Book 60, Hadith 45, as translated at www.sunna.com] (This refers to a Muslim tradition claiming that the two mosques are older than humanity –Ed.)
Therefore, Jerusalem and the Al-Aqsa Mosque are greater than history, and greater than all of the nations and peoples… The one who determines the fate of Jerusalem is not the American president, and not America, and not all of the states of the world (refers to the US recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital; see note below –Ed.). The one who determined the fate of Jerusalem is Allah, and he decided its identity when he set it as the Al-Aqsa Mosque, [and this is how it will be] until the time [of Judgement Day] comes…
Thank you to the civilized world that yesterday said a decisive word [in UN vote condemning the US recognition of Jerusalem], and shame on the nine usual voices – America and a few other satellite states that I tried hard to find on the map and didn’t find their names. Palau, Malau (i.e., meant mockingly), Micronesia - states that no one has heard of! Perhaps the number of their residents equals the number of residents of a ruin, or a small village, or even a street in a Palestinian city. Are these states that will decide the fate of Jerusalem? These thsings, these names of no value? Micro-nesia, micro, small. Someone wrote: ‘I thought that was the name of an antibiotic.’ (Click to view video) A strange thing! But the world stood yesterday alongside the Palestinian right…
When [Prophet] Muhammad, Allah’s blessing upon him, came to Jerusalem [on his Night Journey], he came to receive – let me say it this way – he came to receive the land title to Jerusalem, and forever, forever. Jerusalem is Arab, Islamic, Palestinian, and also Christian forever. The balance [of power] will change, trust in Allah, the balance will change. America will not remain America, and the present world will not remain as it is.
And remember that in the coming 20 years, much water will flow in the river of time, and everything will change, everything. And Palestine and Jerusalem are for their people, for their people, for their people only! We are rooted here, remain here, planted here…
There are duties required of us. We are the ones standing in the first trench in the defense of Jerusalem. And there are duties required of those who are behind us, of our Arab and Muslim brothers, and of the Christians who believe in Jesus, peace be upon him…
The nation – and this is a call to all of the Muslims – must not leave the Palestinians alone, and they must not continue with this foolish question through which there may be those who run away from dealing with the truth: What will the Palestinian leadership do, and what are you doing? The nation must ask itself this question: What will the nation do, what will the states, governments, and peoples do? What will the religious leaders do? Maybe the governments and regimes have political needs, interests, and political calculations of their own, that may be. In politics it is possible to speak a lot in the language of interests. But at the same time there is another factor in the battle for Jerusalem, a factor that cannot bear shading and blurring. It is a factor that some will call culture, or the foundation of consciousness. I call it the foundation of religion and faith. True, we do not want to make the conflict into a struggle between the Quran and the Torah, and we do not want to make the conflict religious. But they raise their rubbish in a religious wrapping in order to market invalid narratives. We, for our part, have our true religious narrative, and it needs to be present in the battle for Jerusalem… The most important, permanent, and influential factor in the battle for Jerusalem – and I say this to the entire nation – is the factor of religion and faith.
What connects the Muslims or Christians in Indonesia or America to Jerusalem is not borders, not geography, not political interests, and not national sentiments… What connects all of them to Jerusalem is the factor of religion and faith. And this does not need to be absent from the scene of battle and confrontation in Jerusalem. In the battle for Jerusalem, religion needs to be present, and also faith.
The question that arises today before all the people of religion in the Arab, Islamic, and Christian world is: Where are you, where are you? Why have you delayed [in coming] to the back lines? You always were and still need to be on the front lines, before everyone. You who lead the consciousness of the nation… where are you today, where are the religious leaders? [...]
The pilgrimage to Jerusalem is part of the battle, part of the battle. Whoever evades this evades the confrontation, [and] ‘turns away on the day of battle.’ And turning away on the day of battle is one of the greatest sins.
And today ‘the battle,’ in the shade of the existing situation, is no longer just ‘a battle’ – and this is not of our choosing, by the way, this is not of our choosing and not of our will, but this is the reality. The ‘battle’ is no longer through an invasion of armies, but rather it is a battle of a different type – a battle of worshippers worshipping, and calls of ‘Allahu Akbar’ emerging from the throats of the visitors to Jerusalem and the Murabitin (i.e., those carrying out Ribat, religious conflict/war to protect land claimed to be Islamic) in Jerusalem, from all over the world. [This is] despite all of the objective circumstances – which there are those who ‘arm themselves’ with them, and the excuses – which there are those who ‘arm themselves’ with them, without knowledge or good intent [claiming] that visiting Jerusalem is normalization. What normalization? With whom? If we the Palestinians are under occupation for 70 years, and we are forced to come in contact with the occupation every day, and we have not normalized our relations with the occupation – and our relations with them are still unnatural, and they will remain so as long as there is an occupation – then how can a visitor who comes for a week normalize [relations]? What happened to you, how do you judge? This is part of the battle! The Muslims must not evade Jerusalem when it calls them. Today Jerusalem is calling you, it is calling millions. We want - we the Palestinians best understand the significance of the matter…
We call on all Muslims: O Muslims, it is your duty today to act for Jerusalem – in your states, in your capitals, and may you come to Jerusalem too, and light up the lamps of Jerusalem – with your presence and your money.
And the battle is almost at its last chapter, and then Allah’s word will be realized for those who evaded the battle: ‘And if you turn away, He will replace you with another people’ [Quran, Sura 47:38, Sahih International translation]. The victory in Jerusalem is coming, it is coming. And Jerusalem is Palestine’s capital forever, forever. And the rubbish of the American president isn’t worth – I say again – isn’t worth the urine of one Jerusalem child.” (Click to view video)
Islam's Prophet Muhammad is said to have ridden during a Night Journey from Mecca to "al aqsa mosque", i.e., "the farthest mosque" (Quran, Sura 17). Five years after Muhammad's death in 632, Jerusalem was conquered by Islamic forces, and in the year 705, Muslim Umayyad leader Abd Al-Malik built a mosque in Jerusalem on the Temple Mount. The mosque was subsequently named the Al-Aqsa Mosque, to identify it as the mosque mentioned in the Quran, thus giving significance to Jerusalem in Islam as a place visited once by Muhammad.
US recognition of Jerusalem as capital of Israel - On Dec. 6, 2017, US President Donald Trump formally recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and instructed the State Department to begin preparations to transfer the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. Trump added that the final borders of Jerusalem will be determined during negotiations.
Supreme Shari’ah Judge, PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas’ advisor on Religious and Islamic Affairs, and Chairman of the Supreme Council for Shari'ah Justice Mahmoud Al-Habbash: "Yesterday you saw, brothers, how the world returned a slap to American President [Trump], how the entire world that the American president had threatened, stuck its tongue out at him and said: 'We are not bought with your dollars, and we are not bought with your aid. From the outset, you did not give us aid because of our beautiful eyes. You aid us for your own interest, and out of your own interests and calculations. So stop this aid! (Click to view video)
Unfortunately, [the US] chose to stand alongside the oppressor, chose of its own will to stand alongside the oppressor and the aggression. It chose to stand alongside the hostility to the Muslims and the Muslim religion, and to the Christians and the Christian religion. The American position towards Jerusalem harmed not only the Muslims throughout the world, but also harmed the Christians, the heart of the Christian faith, as Jerusalem is from their perspective holy land, and a holy city…
The false claim that it is Israel’s capital, even though it does not change anything in reality, … damages first of all the image of the US, and its interests. In the [UN] Security Council, America stood alone against the entire world that said to it: ‘You made a mistake,’ and it is insisting on the mistake.
By the way, they know that they are mistaken. They know that Jerusalem is only ours, only ours. They [the Americans] know it. It is a strange thing that a state that is only a little older than 200 years. takes a stand toward a city that is 5,000 years old. Where was America when Jerusalem was built, that it should decide whose capital it is? And where was Israel when Jerusalem was built? Jerusalem was here before America and before Israel and before Europe and before this entire world. We were in Jerusalem more than 5,000 years ago, and we have not left it. There was no period in history when Jerusalem was empty of its people, and we are its people. (Click to view video) Generations and periods pass over Jerusalem, and we still remain in it. We did not leave it.
Many nations have passed through it, and then they left because they have no bond to it. The Romans came, and before them the Byzantine Greeks, and the Persians came, …and the Crusaders came – and they all left because it is not their city, because it is not theirs. No one leaves their homeland. If it was their homeland, they would not have left it. They would not have left it of their own will. Because they are only looking for interests.
And even if we assume that the version that says – we'll assume – the version that says that the Israelis or Jews came and lived in Jerusalem – even if this was correct – how long did they live there? 70 years? 80 years? Their version says 74 years (sic., Jewish tradition holds it was the Jewish capital for hundreds of years). Afterwards they left (sic., were exiled). Where they found a homeland, they dwell there and live there, because the city [of Jerusalem] is not theirs. While we, since we built it, since the Canaanite Arabs (sic., they were not Arabs) who came from the Arabian Peninsula built it and called it by different names - Jebus, Or Salem, or Aelia [Capitolina] (i.e., the Roman colony built over Jerusalem), and more - since we built it, or our forefathers built it, we have not left it, because it is our capital - because it is our capital and our country and our city. Whereas America, which - as they say - was born yesterday, wants to decide the fate of a city whose age is greater than history, this is what we say out of religious faith.
‘“O Allah's Messenger! Which mosque was first built on the surface of the earth?” He said, “Al- Masjid-ul-Haram (in Mecca) (i.e., the Great Mosque of Mecca).” I said, “Which was built next?” He replied “The mosque of Al-Aqsa (in Jerusalem).” I said, “What was the period of construction between the two?” He said, “Forty years”’ [Sahih Bukhari 3366, Book 60, Hadith 45, as translated at www.sunna.com] (This refers to a Muslim tradition claiming that the two mosques are older than humanity –Ed.)
Therefore, Jerusalem and the Al-Aqsa Mosque are greater than history, and greater than all of the nations and peoples… The one who determines the fate of Jerusalem is not the American president, and not America, and not all of the states of the world (refers to the US recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital; see note below –Ed.). The one who determined the fate of Jerusalem is Allah, and he decided its identity when he set it as the Al-Aqsa Mosque, [and this is how it will be] until the time [of Judgement Day] comes…
Thank you to the civilized world that yesterday said a decisive word [in UN vote condemning the US recognition of Jerusalem], and shame on the nine usual voices – America and a few other satellite states that I tried hard to find on the map and didn’t find their names. Palau, Malau (i.e., meant mockingly), Micronesia - states that no one has heard of! Perhaps the number of their residents equals the number of residents of a ruin, or a small village, or even a street in a Palestinian city. Are these states that will decide the fate of Jerusalem? These thsings, these names of no value? Micro-nesia, micro, small. Someone wrote: ‘I thought that was the name of an antibiotic.’ (Click to view video) A strange thing! But the world stood yesterday alongside the Palestinian right…
When [Prophet] Muhammad, Allah’s blessing upon him, came to Jerusalem [on his Night Journey], he came to receive – let me say it this way – he came to receive the land title to Jerusalem, and forever, forever. Jerusalem is Arab, Islamic, Palestinian, and also Christian forever. The balance [of power] will change, trust in Allah, the balance will change. America will not remain America, and the present world will not remain as it is.
And remember that in the coming 20 years, much water will flow in the river of time, and everything will change, everything. And Palestine and Jerusalem are for their people, for their people, for their people only! We are rooted here, remain here, planted here…
There are duties required of us. We are the ones standing in the first trench in the defense of Jerusalem. And there are duties required of those who are behind us, of our Arab and Muslim brothers, and of the Christians who believe in Jesus, peace be upon him…
The nation – and this is a call to all of the Muslims – must not leave the Palestinians alone, and they must not continue with this foolish question through which there may be those who run away from dealing with the truth: What will the Palestinian leadership do, and what are you doing? The nation must ask itself this question: What will the nation do, what will the states, governments, and peoples do? What will the religious leaders do? Maybe the governments and regimes have political needs, interests, and political calculations of their own, that may be. In politics it is possible to speak a lot in the language of interests. But at the same time there is another factor in the battle for Jerusalem, a factor that cannot bear shading and blurring. It is a factor that some will call culture, or the foundation of consciousness. I call it the foundation of religion and faith. True, we do not want to make the conflict into a struggle between the Quran and the Torah, and we do not want to make the conflict religious. But they raise their rubbish in a religious wrapping in order to market invalid narratives. We, for our part, have our true religious narrative, and it needs to be present in the battle for Jerusalem… The most important, permanent, and influential factor in the battle for Jerusalem – and I say this to the entire nation – is the factor of religion and faith.
What connects the Muslims or Christians in Indonesia or America to Jerusalem is not borders, not geography, not political interests, and not national sentiments… What connects all of them to Jerusalem is the factor of religion and faith. And this does not need to be absent from the scene of battle and confrontation in Jerusalem. In the battle for Jerusalem, religion needs to be present, and also faith.
The question that arises today before all the people of religion in the Arab, Islamic, and Christian world is: Where are you, where are you? Why have you delayed [in coming] to the back lines? You always were and still need to be on the front lines, before everyone. You who lead the consciousness of the nation… where are you today, where are the religious leaders? [...]
The pilgrimage to Jerusalem is part of the battle, part of the battle. Whoever evades this evades the confrontation, [and] ‘turns away on the day of battle.’ And turning away on the day of battle is one of the greatest sins.
And today ‘the battle,’ in the shade of the existing situation, is no longer just ‘a battle’ – and this is not of our choosing, by the way, this is not of our choosing and not of our will, but this is the reality. The ‘battle’ is no longer through an invasion of armies, but rather it is a battle of a different type – a battle of worshippers worshipping, and calls of ‘Allahu Akbar’ emerging from the throats of the visitors to Jerusalem and the Murabitin (i.e., those carrying out Ribat, religious conflict/war to protect land claimed to be Islamic) in Jerusalem, from all over the world. [This is] despite all of the objective circumstances – which there are those who ‘arm themselves’ with them, and the excuses – which there are those who ‘arm themselves’ with them, without knowledge or good intent [claiming] that visiting Jerusalem is normalization. What normalization? With whom? If we the Palestinians are under occupation for 70 years, and we are forced to come in contact with the occupation every day, and we have not normalized our relations with the occupation – and our relations with them are still unnatural, and they will remain so as long as there is an occupation – then how can a visitor who comes for a week normalize [relations]? What happened to you, how do you judge? This is part of the battle! The Muslims must not evade Jerusalem when it calls them. Today Jerusalem is calling you, it is calling millions. We want - we the Palestinians best understand the significance of the matter…
We call on all Muslims: O Muslims, it is your duty today to act for Jerusalem – in your states, in your capitals, and may you come to Jerusalem too, and light up the lamps of Jerusalem – with your presence and your money.
And the battle is almost at its last chapter, and then Allah’s word will be realized for those who evaded the battle: ‘And if you turn away, He will replace you with another people’ [Quran, Sura 47:38, Sahih International translation]. The victory in Jerusalem is coming, it is coming. And Jerusalem is Palestine’s capital forever, forever. And the rubbish of the American president isn’t worth – I say again – isn’t worth the urine of one Jerusalem child.” (Click to view video)
Islam's Prophet Muhammad is said to have ridden during a Night Journey from Mecca to "al aqsa mosque", i.e., "the farthest mosque" (Quran, Sura 17). Five years after Muhammad's death in 632, Jerusalem was conquered by Islamic forces, and in the year 705, Muslim Umayyad leader Abd Al-Malik built a mosque in Jerusalem on the Temple Mount. The mosque was subsequently named the Al-Aqsa Mosque, to identify it as the mosque mentioned in the Quran, thus giving significance to Jerusalem in Islam as a place visited once by Muhammad.
US recognition of Jerusalem as capital of Israel - On Dec. 6, 2017, US President Donald Trump formally recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and instructed the State Department to begin preparations to transfer the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. Trump added that the final borders of Jerusalem will be determined during negotiations.