Abbas recommended to Arafat to stop PA terror campaign (Second Intifada) because “we wouldn’t achieve anything, and it was a disaster”
Official PA TV program The Philosophy of Patience, on PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas’ recollections from the PA terror campaign (the second Intifada, 2000-2005), aired March 23, 2018, rebroadcast April 2, 2018
Official PA TV narrator: “The delegation returned to Ramallah and [at the time Israeli opposition leader and later Prime Minister] Ariel Sharon held his provocative visit to the Al-Aqsa Mosque accompanied by 3,000 Israeli soldiers, and the Al-Aqsa Intifada (i.e., PA terror campaign 2000-2005) broke out. The intifada continued and the negotiations with the Israelis were stopped…”
PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas: “After the second Intifada broke out due to Sharon’s visit, I was with [then PA Chairman] brother Yasser Arafat and [PLO Chief Negotiator] Saeb Erekat in a plane- here, he hears us. From the third day I said to him: ‘Yasser Arafat, this intifada must stop, because it’s a snowball that you don’t know where it will roll.’ Yasser Arafat heard me and heard the others, and he didn’t have to pay attention to my words. He waited, he thought, and they made him understand that it’s possible that things will develop and we will achieve something. My opinion was that we wouldn’t achieve anything, and it was a disaster that ended with the Martyrdom-death (Istish’had) of Yasser Arafat. It ended with the occupation of the entire West Bank and the destruction of all the agreements that were signed between us and Israel, and we are still suffering from this to this day.”
Official PA TV narrator: “The delegation returned to Ramallah and [at the time Israeli opposition leader and later Prime Minister] Ariel Sharon held his provocative visit to the Al-Aqsa Mosque accompanied by 3,000 Israeli soldiers, and the Al-Aqsa Intifada (i.e., PA terror campaign 2000-2005) broke out. The intifada continued and the negotiations with the Israelis were stopped…”
PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas: “After the second Intifada broke out due to Sharon’s visit, I was with [then PA Chairman] brother Yasser Arafat and [PLO Chief Negotiator] Saeb Erekat in a plane- here, he hears us. From the third day I said to him: ‘Yasser Arafat, this intifada must stop, because it’s a snowball that you don’t know where it will roll.’ Yasser Arafat heard me and heard the others, and he didn’t have to pay attention to my words. He waited, he thought, and they made him understand that it’s possible that things will develop and we will achieve something. My opinion was that we wouldn’t achieve anything, and it was a disaster that ended with the Martyrdom-death (Istish’had) of Yasser Arafat. It ended with the occupation of the entire West Bank and the destruction of all the agreements that were signed between us and Israel, and we are still suffering from this to this day.”