PA daily op-ed: Israel spreads drugs to destroy Palestinian youth

Excerpt of an op-ed by Muwaffaq Matar, Fatah Revolutionary Council member and regular columnist for the official PA daily

Headline: “Drugs – Israel’s destructive weapon”

“The terror system in Tel Aviv has brought all the types of lethal weapons [into play] against the Palestinian people, and does not shy away from using the most lethal weapons, not only against young people but also against children…

It is very dangerous, and we are certain that this is liable to reach a point of existential danger if we do not all hurry to defend our people in Jerusalem with all that we have fromthe scourge of drugs…

The Israeli occupation’s security forces are interested in there being drug needles in the hands of the children, youth, and young people instead of books, pens, or work tools, because drug needles kill the soul and lead the users to a stage of helplessness…

The Israeli occupation forces are digging everywhere in the [Shuafat] refugee camp [in Jerusalem] searching for young fighters, butthey turn a blind eye to the drug dealers who sell their poisons in the gates of the schools in the camp, knowing that the occupation authorities’ police are secretly securing them and protecting them…

The drug dealers are the occupation’s pawns, whose goal is to make our young men and women fall into the clutches of the Israeli intelligence forces. This means that they are more dangerous to society, values, and law than any spy or agent whose mission leads to the killing of civilians or the endangering of the national interests.”