Abbas demands to gather "Arab and international support to end the Israeli occupation” and release all Palestinian terrorist prisoners

Headline: “The [PA] president emphasized the importance of carrying out that which appears in the order of public freedoms in the State of Palestine”

“The Fatah Movement Central Committee held a meeting yesterday evening, Thursday [Feb. 25, 2021], led by [PA] President Mahmoud Abbas at the [PA] presidential headquarters in Ramallah.

At the beginning of the meeting, the president briefed the central committee members on the recent developments to gather Arab and international support for the Palestinian cause, in order to end the Israeli occupation of the land of the State of Palestine, realize the establishment of the state on the 1967 borders with East Jerusalem as its capital, resolve the refugees’ cause according to [UN] Resolution 194 (see note below -Ed.), and release the Palestinian prisoners being detained in the Israeli occupation’s prisons…

The central committee saluted the resolve of our people on their land wherever they are, whether in the Gaza Strip or in the West Bank including occupied Jerusalem, against the occupier through peaceful popular resistance (i.e., term used by Palestinians, which also refers to the use of violence and terror) in all our Palestinian cities and villages, in a manner that serves the security of our people and its defense.”

UN Resolution 194 (Chapter 11, Dec. 11, 1948) states that "refugees wishing to return to their homes and live at peace with their neighbors should be permitted to do so at the earliest practicable date, and that compensation should be paid for the property of those choosing not to return." Palestinian leaders argue this means that all Arabs who left Israel during the war (hundreds of thousands) and their descendants (a few million) have a "right of return" to Israel. Israel argues that the resolution only calls for a limited return and only under certain conditions, especially focusing on the words "wishing to return... and live at peace with their neighbors."

The terms "peaceful uprising/resistance,” and “popular uprising/resistance" are used by PA leaders at times to refer to peaceful protest and at times to refer to deadly terror attacks and terror waves. For example, ‎Mahmoud Abbas defined as “peaceful popular” the murderous terror during the 2015-2016 ‎terror wave (“The Knife Intifada”), in which 40 people were killed (36 Israelis, 1 Palestinian, 2 Americans and 1 Eritrean) and hundreds wounded in stabbings, shootings, and car ramming attacks. Abbas said: "We want peaceful popular uprising, and that’s what this is." https://palwatch.org/page/9276