Abbas’ advisor: There was no Jewish history in Israel - “There never was a kingdom of Israel”

PA Supreme Shari’ah Judge Mahmoud Al-Habbash: “Their narrative, the version of the peoples of the book [the Jews and Christians], the bible scholars, orientalists, writers on the bible, etc., they say there was an Israeli kingdom on the land of Palestine in a certain period in history. This is their narrative and they are free to say so, but we don’t believe in this … There never was a kingdom of Israel... Relying on the Quran and history, we say differently. We say that Jerusalem is Canaanite, Arab, and Palestinian, and thus it also remained. It may be that groups or individuals came from the Children of Israel in different forms, some of their prophets came and stayed here, but they had no political entity or political kingdom on the land… There is no theory that based on history and antiquities says that the kingdom of Israel was in Palestine. Not at all… If someone tries to force us to acknowledge their narrative, this is a kind of terror of ideas. We don’t force anyone to recognize our narrative.”

Mahmoud Al-Habbash also serves as Chairman of the Supreme Council for Shari'ah Justice. In August 2019 PA Chairman Abbas dismissed all his advisors by Presidential decree. It is unclear what their status is today.