PA: Don't kill American Jews (only kill Israeli Jews)
PA: Don't kill American Jews (only kill Israeli Jews)
PA condemnation of the murder of Jews in a Pittsburgh synagogue
is diametrically opposed to PA ideology
by Itamar Marcus
by Itamar Marcus
In an unusual move, the Palestinian Authority Ministry of Foreign Affairs condemned yesterday's murder of 11 Jews in the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh by the antisemite Robert Bowers:
"The [PA] Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Expatriates condemned the terror attack that was carried out yesterday against a synagogue in Pittsburgh, which is in the state of Pennsylvania in the US, and which cost the lives of Jewish American citizens and police officers. The ministry also condemned the harming of houses of worship by the same terrorists filled with an inherent and decayed fascist ideology, which is based on the supremacy of the white race and its hegemony."
[WAFA, official PA news agency, Oct. 28, 2018]
(See full text below)
This condemnation of the murder of Jews is a remarkable change from the standard PA messages to Palestinians. For years, PA policy has been to present the conflict with Israel as both a nationalistic war to destroy Israel and an Islamic war to kill Jews. Indeed, the messages of the PA leadership since the PA's terror campaign (2000 - 2005, the Second Intifada) has been to kill Israelis because they are Jews.
As recently as last week, Palestinian Media Watch reported on an antisemitic sermon in which the preacher taught that Hitler was one of a series of people sent by Allah throughout history to punish the Jews because of their evil behavior.
The PA's new message seems to be: Don't kill American Jews but continue to kill Israeli Jews.
The following are some examples starting from the PA's terror campaign in 2000 in which the PA expressed its policy demonizing Israelis because they were Jews and calling to kill Israelis specifically because they were Jews:
"The Jews are the Jews, whether Labor or Likud, the Jews are the Jews. They do not have any moderates or any advocates of peace. They are all liars... They must be butchered and they must be killed, as Allah said [in the Quran]: 'Fight them, Allah will punish them by your hands. He will humiliate them, and grant you victory over them.' The Jews are like a spring: As long as you step on it with your foot, it doesn't move. But if you lift your foot off the spring, it hurts you and punishes you. This is the case of the Jews. Have no mercy on the Jews anywhere in and country. [Quran]: 'Fight them wherever you are, wherever you meet them - kill them.' Wherever you are - kill those Jews and those Americans who are like them and those who stand with them. They are all together against the Arab and the Muslims."
[Dr. Ahmed Yousuf Abu Halabiah, a member of the Palestinian Shari'ah (Islamic religious law) Rulings Council,
and Rector of Advanced Studies at the Islamic University, Palestinian Television, Oct. 13, 2000]
Dr. Muhammad Ibrahim Madi, Palestinian Authority cleric with regular PA TV program on Islam: "I was delighted when a youth said to me: 'Oh, Sheikh, I am 14 years old, I have 4 more years, and then I will blow myself up among Allah's enemies. I will blow myself up among the Jews.' I said: 'My little son, I'll ask Allah [to grant] you Martyrdom.'
We blow them up in Hadera, we blow them up in Tel-Aviv and in Netanya through the mastery that Allah placed us upon this riff-raff. If there is no way out of death, it is shameful for us to die as cowards. The Jews have bared their teeth....they will not be deterred except by the color of the blood of their filthy people. They will not be deterred unless we blow ourselves up willingly and voluntarily among them. The Prophet Muhammad said: 'The Jews will fight against you but Allah will make you masters over them.' That is, not only through the bravery of our sons but also Allah will make the Muslim master of the Jew. Blessings upon anyone who has charged at a soldier for the sake of Allah. Blessings upon anyone who has acted for the sake of Allah and has gone on raids for His sake. Blessings upon anyone who has brought up his sons with the education of Jihad and Martyrdom-seeking. Blessings upon anyone who has saved a single bullet in order to put it through a Jew's head. We shall enter Jerusalem as conquerors and Jaffa as conquerors, and Haifa as conquerors and Ashkelon as conquerors."
[Sheikh Dr. Muhammad Ibrahim Madi, Friday sermon on PA TV, Aug. 3, 2001].
A very significant religious teaching appeared in the official PA daily in a religious article by Sheikh Muhammad Abd Al Hadi La'afi, the senior PA religious official - responsible for Religious Teaching and Instruction in the Office of the Waqf. Here he taught that Islam is destined to continue fighting and killing Jews until their annihilation:
"The battle with the Jews will surely come... the decisive Muslim victory is coming without a doubt, and the prophet spoke about in more than one Hadith and the Day of Resurrection will not come without the victory of the believers [the Muslims] over the descendants of the monkeys and pigs (i.e., the Jews) and with their annihilation."
[Official PA daily, Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, May 18, 2001]
Dr. Mahmoud Mustafa Najem, PA religious figure: "The Prophet Muhammad, whom the Jews tried to murder more than once, by poisoning, by witchcraft by throwing stones at him and by all kinds of political assassination. He warned us of the Jews, the evil of the Jews and the deceit of the Jews... He waged war on them and expelled them from Arabia, saying: 'There shall not be two religions in Arabia.' He explained the character of the Jew in the Quran and in the Sunna (Islamic traditions) so that we would beware of them all the time and so that we would know how to deal with the Jews... Say to the Jews: 'Expect your graveyard! Expect the final battle.'"
[Official PA TV, Feb. 8, 2002]
Dr. Mahmoud Mustafa Najem, PA religious figure: "Praise unto Allah, Who cursed our enemies; curse upon curse up to Judgment Day. And He has cursed them as well through the words of His prophets and emissaries... The Jews, however, as is their nature, and as Allah described them in His Book, [characterizing them] by conceit, pride, arrogance, rampage, disloyalty and treachery... They have a single common trait: enmity of Islam and Moslems... Note [their] deceit and cunning. Thus, it is not an exception to their nature, for which Allah transformed them to apes and pigs. [Quran] "We said to them: Be apes, despised and loathed.""
[Official PA TV, Nov. 1, 2002]
Ibrahim Mudayris, official, PA Ministry of Religious Trusts and Religious Affairs: "The Prophet said: 'The resurrection will not take place until the Muslims fight the Jews, and the Muslims kill them. The Muslims will kill the Jews, rejoice [in it], rejoice in Allah's victory. The Muslims will kill the Jews, and he will hide.' The Prophet said: 'The Jews will hide behind rock and tree, and the rock and tree will say: 'Oh servant of Allah, oh Muslim, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him!' Why is there this malice? Because there are none who love the Jews on the face of the earth: not man, not rock, and not tree. Everything hates them. They destroy everything. They destroy the trees and destroy the houses. Everything wants vengeance on the Jews, on these pigs on the face of the earth, and the day of our victory, Allah willing, will come."
[Official PA TV, Sept. 10, 2004]
Dr. Muhammad Ibrahim Madi, Palestinian Authority cleric: "All the weapons must be aimed at the Jews, Allah's enemies, the cursed nation in the Quran, whom Allah describes as apes and pigs, worshippers of the calf and idol worshippers...Nothing will deter them except the color of blood in their filthy nation... We are waging this cruel war with the brothers of the apes and pigs, the Jews and the sons of Zion. The Jews will fight you and you will subjugate them. Until the Jew will stand behind the tree and the rock. And the tree and the rock will say: oh Muslim, oh servant of Allah, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him."
[Official PA TV, Sept. 12, 2004]
Ibrahim Mudayris, official, PA Ministry of Religious Trusts and Religious Affairs: "Why did Allah change the direction of prayer from Al-Aqsa Mosque (in Jerusalem) to Al-Haram Mosque (in Mecca)? The reason is those [Jews] who are the cause of all catastrophes on earth. The reason for it is those [Jews] who spit their poisons at the international and regional level, those [Jews] who are the reason for every disaster of the world..."
[Official PA TV, Sept. 24, 2004]
Ibrahim Mudayris, official, PA Ministry of Religious Trusts and Religious Affairs: "The Prophet said: The Resurrection will not take place until the Muslims fight the Jews, and the Muslims kill them. Rejoice in Allah's victory... Everything wants vengeance on the Jews... these pigs on the face of the earth. And the day of our victory, Allah willing, will come."
[Official PA TV, Oct. 10, 2004]
Ibrahim Mudayris, official, PA Ministry of Religious Trusts and Religious Affairs: "The Muslim remembers how the Jews corrupted the land... Oh Muslims! The Jews are Jews. Their character and custom are the corruption and destruction of this land. We keep warning you: the Jews are a cancer that spreads inside the body of the Islamic and Arab nation.... They invest in the East Asian countries, which were destroyed [by the Tsunami] because of the Jewish and American corruption and destruction."
[Official PA TV, Jan. 7, 2005]
Ibrahim Mudayris, official, PA Ministry of Religious Trusts and Religious Affairs: "The Jews are a virus similar to AIDS, from which the entire world is suffering. You'll find Jews behind every conflict on Earth. The suffering of nations-the Jews are behind it! Ask Britain what it did to the Jews! They persecuted them, tortured them! Ask France! They tortured them, persecuted them and burned their Talmud, for the conflicts that they tried to ignite in France. Ask Portugal... Ask Czarist Russia-who invited the Jews who then plotted to murder the Czar! And he massacred them repeatedly. Don't ask Germany what it did to the Jews, since the Jews are the ones who provoked Nazism to fight the entire world."
[Official PA TV, May 13, 2005]
The religious hate teaching did not stop with the end of the intifada but have continued until today. These are some examples:
Dr. Tayseer Al-Tamimi, PA Chief Justice of Religious Court, and Chairman of Supreme Council of Islamic Law: "Concerning the Jews, the Holy Quran says that they lack understanding, are void of wisdom, know nothing, violate agreements, etc. However, the Jews were known - it was known about them throughout history - that they make false claims, lies, forgery, slander, and fabrications, in order to justify their aggression, land theft, defilement of holy sites, appropriation of land, destruction of homes, murder of children, women, and the elderly."
[Official PA TV, June 9, 2009]
Hate speech of a Friday sermon in a mosque, broadcast on PA TV by an unidentified preacher. He quotes the same Islamic tradition cited above by others, that Muslims' destiny is to kill Jews and bring about their genocide:
"The Jews, the enemies of Allah and of His Messenger, the enemies of Allah and of His Messenger! Enemies of humanity in general, and of Palestinians in particular... Our enmity with the Jews is a matter of faith, more than an enmity because of occupation and the land... Oh Muslims! The Jews are the Jews. The Jews are the Jews. Even if donkeys would cease to bray, dogs cease to bark, wolves cease to howl and snakes to bite, the Jews would not cease to harbor hatred towards Muslims. The Prophet said that if two Jews would be alone with a Muslim, they would think only of killing him... The Prophet says: 'You shall fight the Jews and kill them, until the tree and the stone will speak and say: 'Oh Muslim, Oh servant of Allah' - the tree and the stone will not say, 'Oh Arab,' they will say, 'Oh Muslim'. And they will not say, 'Where are the millions?' and will not say, 'Where is the Arab nation?' Rather, they will say, 'Oh Muslim, Oh servant of Allah - there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him.'..."
[Official PA TV, Jan. 29, 2010]
Muhammad Hussein, PA Mufti, appointee of Mahmoud Abbas: "The Al-Aqsa Mosque is threatened by the plans of the enemies of Allah [the Jews], who have violated all faith and religious laws, and even deviated from their humanity."
[Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, June 26, 2010]
An article on religion in the official PA daily by Sheikh Ishaq Feleifel taught that Jews have an inherent evil Jewish nature - and comes from Adam's first son who murdered his brother:
"In this lesson I wanted to talk about Cain and Abel - that's the first story on earth, whose victim was Abel, at the hands of his brother Cain - because this story shows a similarity to the Jews and their crimes... The Jews, by throwing off their yoke, followed in the footsteps of the first person on earth who threw off the yoke of Allah. Their [the Jews'] evil nature is drawn from Adam's first son [who murdered his brother]..."
[Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, May 13, 2011]
An article in official PA daily wrote that Zionism is a religious Jewish plan to rule over the non- Jewish world, and "Goyim [non-Jews] must submit to their will"
"The source of the name 'Zionism' is 'Mount Zion', one of the four mountains upon which the city of Jerusalem was founded. The Jews believe that their God lives there. Zionism is an extreme religious ideology whose aim is political hegemony and the transformation of a Jewish monarchy in Palestine into a basis for their eternal rule over the world, that others, "Goyim" [non-Jews], must submit to their will, which is drawn from the will of God."
[Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, May 15, 2011]
The same religion columnist Sheikh Ishaq Feleifel taught in the official PA daily that Judaism is a "distorted, corrupted, falsified religion":
"The struggle between truth and falsehood is as ancient as life upon this earth... yet the mighty Islam, from the breaking of its dawn and the spreading of its light up until our time, has been targeted by its enemies... The conflict between us and the Jews is not a conflict about land and borders, but rather a conflict about faith and existence."
[Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, June 3, 2011]
At a Fatah celebration the current PA Mufti, an appointee of Mahmoud Abbas, said that the war against Israel is a war for extermination of Jews. The moderator introduced him as follows:
Moderator: "Our war with the descendents of the apes and pigs (i.e., Jews) is a war of religion and faith. Long live Fatah."
Muhammad Hussein, current PA Mufti, appointee of Mahmoud Abbas: "47 years ago the [Fatah] revolution started. Which revolution? The modern revolution of the Palestinian people's history. In fact, Palestine in its entirety is a revolution, since [Caliph] Umar came [to conquer Jerusalem, 637 CE], and continuing today, and until the End of Days. The reliable Hadith (tradition attributed to Muhammad), in the two reliable collections, Bukhari and Muslim, says:
"The Hour [of Resurrection] will not come until you fight the Jews. The Jew will hide behind stones or trees. Then the stones or trees will call: 'Oh Muslim, servant of Allah, there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him.' Except the Gharqad tree [which will keep silent]."
Therefore it is no wonder that you see Gharqad surrounding the [Israeli] settlements and colonies. This is Palestine, when we talk about it, from the beginning of the Jihad, with the continuation of the Jihad, with the struggle, and with the way of the Martyrs."
[Official PA TV, Jan. 9, 2012]
Imad Hamato, appointed by Mahmoud Abbas to be dean of Gaza Al-Azhar schools: "Humanity will never live in comfort as long as the Jews are causing devastating corruption throughout the land. Humanity will never live in peace or fortune or tranquility as long as they are corrupting the land. An old man told me: If a fish in the sea fights with another fish, I am sure the Jews are behind it. As Allah says: ''Every time they kindled the fire of war [against you], Allah extinguished it. They strive throughout the land [causing] corruption, and Allah does not like corrupters'' (Sura 5:64)."
[Official PA TV, Feb. 27, 2015]
Mahmoud Abbas' Advisor on Religious and Islamic Affairs and Supreme Shari'ah Judge Mahmoud Al-Habbash: "The conflict here in Palestine between us and the criminal occupation and its criminal leaders, is a further manifestation of our trials, a further manifestation of the historic conflict between truth and falsehood, between good and evil. Throughout history, there has been a conflict between good and evil. The good is represented by the prophets and their supporters. The evil is represented by the devils and their supporters, by the satans and their supporters. We are not inventing anything new here (i.e., Palestinian-Israeli). This is a conflict between two entities, good and evil, between two projects: Allah's project vs. Satan's project, a project connected to Allah, which is his will - true and good - and a project connected to oppression and Satanism, to Satanism and animosity, occupation and barbarism."
[Official PA TV, Oct. 23, 2015]
Unidentified official PA TV Preacher: "Allah, punish Your enemies, the enemies of religion, count their numbers and kill them to the last one, and bring them a black day. Allah, punish the wicked Jews, and those among the atheists who help them. Allah, we ask that You bestow upon us respect and honor by enabling us to repel them, and we ask You to save us from their evil."
[Official PA TV, April 22, 2016]
The most important religious figure in the Palestinian Authority and the closest to PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas, continues to tell Palestinians that the conflict with Israel is an uncompromising religious war for Islam against Israel and Jews. Mahmoud Al-Habbash, who was appointed by Abbas as his personal advisor on Islam and the PA's Supreme Shari'ah Judge, recently stated that conflict today with Israel is "The Battle of History between Islam and the enemies of Islam." Israelis/Jews are the"enemies of Islam," "enemies of Muslims," have a "culture of Satan," and represent "evil." Worse yet, Al-Habbash explained that the current battle is not just another battle on behalf of Islam. It is the ultimate battle described in the Quran as the "final promise," leading to great destruction for the "Children of Israel":
"Jerusalem is the arena of conflict between us and the colonialist project [Israel]... Jerusalem's [Al-Aqsa] Mosque apparently is the heading for the eruption of the conflict and The Battle of History between Islam and the enemies of Islam; between the Muslims and the enemies of Muslims; between the Islamic culture in all its splendor and human glory and the culture of Satan attempting to establish oppression and aggression at the expense of the culture of truth and goodness... This mosque is decreed to be the arena of the battle between good and evil. This mosque and this wonderful city - the city of history, religion, and culture, Jerusalem - are decreed to be the heading of the conflict... Jerusalem is the heading of this battle, this conflict, and this round, which I and many others see as the key, as the first step, as the spark of the battle of the ''final promise.'''
[Official PA TV, Quranic Horizons, June 30, 2018]
The following is the full text of the condemnation of the attack on the synagogue in Pittsburgh by the PA's Ministry of Foreign Affairs statement:
"The [PA] Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Expatriates condemned the terror attack that was carried out yesterday against a synagogue in Pittsburgh, which is in the state of Pennsylvania in the US, and which cost the lives of Jewish American citizens and police officers (11 people were murdered and others were injured in the attack -Ed.)
The ministry also condemned the harming of houses of worship by the same terrorists filled with an inherent and decayed fascist ideology, which is based on the supremacy of the white race and its hegemony. It added: 'This type of terror is the most dangerous because it is inside the society and targets anyone who differs in their appearance, race, religion, or path.'
The ministry emphasized our solidarity with the American people, who is suffering in an ongoing manner from the phenomenon of terror, and [emphasized] our condolences for the bereaved families. The ministry added that 'This terror must be called by its name, and it must be condemned - regardless of its form.'
The ministry said that at a time when it condemns all forms of terror, it again warns against the dangers and consequences of the culture of hatred, extremism, racism, denial of the other, and colonialism, and calls on the senior officials, world leaders, civil society organizations, and public opinion shapers to strengthen and coordinate the efforts against terror, its organizations, and its sources."
[WAFA, official PA news agency, Oct. 28, 2018]