Abbas deputy at university festival commemorating arch-terrorist: Abu Jihad “whom everyone loved… had an incredible amount of qualities”

Official PA TV News, on a Student Union Council festival at Al-Quds Open University to mark Palestinian Prisoner’s Day and the death of terrorist Khalil Al-Wazir “Abu Jihad” – who was responsible for the murder of 125 Israelis

Visual: The screenshot shows the stage of the Al-Quds Open University festival. The backdrop of the stage is a large poster with a picture of former PLO and PA Chairman Yasser Arafat on the left and PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas on the right; at the bottom is a picture of Jerusalem with the Dome of the Rock visible.

Text on poster: “Yasser [Arafat]’s University
Welcome to the Festival of Loyalty and Honor
Our loyalty is to the Martyrs and our honor (the text is blocked by the podium –Ed.)… our prisoners”

Caption on screen: “Festival in memory of the death as a Martyr of Abu Jihad (i.e., terrorist responsible for murder of 125 Israelis) and Palestinian Prisoner’s Day”

Fatah Deputy Chairman and Fatah Central Committee member Mahmoud Al-Aloul: “This leader [Khalil Al-Wazir Abu Jihad] whom everyone loved is a very important value in this Palestinian people’s conscience. He had an incredible amount of qualities that prepared him to be a leader on this path…
For this generation to completely understand and know about its Martyrs and the founders of this revolutionary path and the significance, they should study the values of these leaders who led and died as Martyrs. They should study their values, so that they will help them in completing this path.”

Yasser Arafat – Founder of Fatah and former chairman of the PLO and PA. During the 1960s, 70s and 80s Arafat was behind numerous terror attacks against Israelis. Although he received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1994 together with then Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and then Israeli Minister of Foreign Affairs Shimon Peres “for their efforts to create peace in the Middle East" after signing the Oslo Accords peace agreement, Arafat launched a 5-year terror campaign - the second Intifada (2000-2005) – in which more than 1,000 Israelis were murdered. Arafat died of an illness in 2004.

Abu Jihad (Khalil Al-Wazir) - was a founder of Fatah and deputy to Yasser Arafat. He headed the PLO terror organization's military wing and also planned many deadly Fatah terror attacks in the 1960’s - 1980’s. These attacks, in which a total of 125 Israelis were murdered, included the Coastal Road attack that (until Oct. 7, 2023) was the most lethal in Israeli history - the hijacking of a bus and murder of 37 civilians, 12 of them children.