PMW Special Report: The Palestinian Authority’s false narrative claiming Israel is an “artificial colonial implant”
Israel is a "satanic project" created by colonialism – Abbas' advisor
Jews should "return to their origins in Europe and other states from which they came" – PLO official
Israel "was artificially grown (through a test tube)" and "established based on the decision of leaders of colonialist states" – columnist for official PA daily
"Palestine will be liberated like it was liberated from the yoke of the ancient colonialist powers" – PA official
Netanyahu "exploited Oct. 7. for satanic plot" to reshape region for "the American colonialist project" – Abbas' advisor
"Israel is a guarantee for Americans and Europeans to control this entire region and everything in it" – top PA official Rajoub
"Israel is a tool for the Crusader states" and all the American administrations – columnist for official PA daily
The Middle East was a threat to Europe, Israel was created as "a hostile entity and a friend to colonialism" – official PA TV
Jews came here for money "to be a military base for the West in the Middle East" – employee of PA-controlled organization
Israel was "established through theft" led by "colonialist states" headed by Britain – Ret. PA official
- Israel is "a state someone put together" – PLO official
The Palestinian Authority's presentation of Israel as a foreign colonial implant in the Middle East is one of the most fundamental parts of its ideology, around which the PA has built the Palestinian identity.
The PA's denial of thousands of years of Jewish history in the Land of Israel includes the lies that Jews did not live there and would never have thought of settling there until Western colonialism "planted" them in "Palestine." According to the false PA narrative, the West hatched Zionism to solve its Jewish problem by getting rid of its society-destroying Jews, who could then serve as a front line "against the Arab states" in the region. PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas explained that Europeans in general suffered from the Jews and "even Hitler… fought the Jews because they worked based on usury and money, in other words, they caused ruin." Getting rid of the harmful Jews and having a colonial implant is what Abbas called "two birds with one stone."
The colonialism narrative is central to PA ideology as it denies Israel any rights to exist in any borders. It also efficiently creates backing around the world for the PA's claim to "Palestine from the river to the sea." During the current war, this slogan and the colonialism narrative have been adopted by pro-Palestinian protesters internationally as a definitive truth.
This "satanic project" – as PA Chairman Abbas' advisor Mahmoud Al-Habbash terms Zionism and the creation of Israel – was started by the British, which "brought in strangers who had no connection to Palestine." The PA claims that international colonialism wanted to destabilize the Arab region and therefore "created the Zionist idea" and "planted" the Jews in "Palestine":
Abbas' advisor: "The British Mandate opened the doors to Jewish immigration to Palestine and brought in strangers who had no connection to Palestine... Maybe the world will not recognize the [Palestinian] political entity but rather [only] a part of the historical homeland, but the historical homeland will remain all of Palestine (i.e., all of Israel) for all the Palestinians... Colonialism wanted to divide the region and plant in the heart of this region a foreign element that is Israel, so that it will remain an arena of tension, lack of security, and lack of stability…a people that is foreign to the region and a friend of the colonialist states: The Jews. So, they created the Zionist idea... this satanic project, the colonial project of Palestine and the theft of Palestine.'"
[PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas' Advisor on Religious Affairs and Islamic Relations Mahmoud Al-Habbash, Facebook page, Nov. 29, 2024]
Palestinian Media Watch has exposed numerous statements by Al-Habbash in which he has labeled Jews and Israelis as "Satan" and "evil."
According to Al-Habbash, Israel now serves "the American colonialist project," and Israeli PM Netanyahu "exploited" Hamas' massacre and launch of its terror war against Israel on Oct. 7, 2023 for this "satanic plot":
Al-Habbash: "[Israeli Prime Minister] Netanyahu exploited what happened on Oct. 7, 2023 to carry out his satanic plot that strives to eliminate the Palestinian cause and expand the scope of the war into a regional war, with which he will outline anew the geographical and political maps of the region in a way that will serve the American colonialist project, which strives for hegemony and colonialism of a new kind in the Arab region."
[PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas' Advisor on Religious Affairs and Islamic Relations Mahmoud Al-Habbash, Facebook page, Oct. 9, 2024]
Similarly, top PA and Fatah official Jibril Rajoub has claimed that "the Americans and the Europeans" use Israel to "control the entire region" and its resources:
Fatah Central Committee Secretary Jibril Rajoub: "[Israel] is a project that targets the entire Middle East region. Israel is a guarantee for the Americans and Europeans to control this entire region, its oil, its sea routes, its economy, everything in it."
[Sky News Arabia website, Jan. 15, 2025;
Fatah Central Committee Secretary Jibril Rajoub, Facebook page,
Jan. 15, 2025]
The PA's answer to why Jews went along with the West's plans and willingly established themselves in "Palestine," to which they had no connection, is answered by PA antisemitic ideology: The Jews came for money, lured here by the West with promises that they could earn more money in "Palestine" than elsewhere:
Advisor to Head of The Committee to Resist Settlements and the Wall Ayed Morrar: "If an opportunity was given to the expansionist occupation (i.e., Israel) to settle in Egypt and Jordan they would not miss the opportunity... There is no religious or emotional connection between a resident of the occupation state (i.e., Jews) and this state. They told him: You earn $1,000 in France, in Palestine you can earn $1,200 or $1,500, and therefore he came for this reason, with international support, to be a military base for the West in the Middle East."
[Official PA TV, Dec. 12, 2024]
A different explanation was provided by a Tunisian academic who explained that "traditional colonialism" was in fact "Zionist colonialism":
Political science lecturer Dr. Ibrahim Al-Rifa'i: "Was traditional colonialism just French and British?"
Official PA TV host: "Or Italian?"
Ibrahim Al-Rifa'i: "It was actually Zionist colonialism... They [the Jews] think that the entire world that is outside the circle of Zionism are goyim (i.e., non-Jews) and that Zionist globalization should rule, and they have been waging a world war ever since the time before traditional colonialism. Traditional colonialism was completely Zionist. This colonialism with its various names – British, English, French – was just Zionist colonialism."
[Official PA TV, Capital of Capitals – Tunis, Feb. 12, 2025]
Official PA TV helps cement the PA narrative that Israel was created as a colonialist outpost. A host on PA TV taught viewers that because the Middle East was "a threat" to "European and American capitalism," Israel was created as "a hostile entity" in the Arab region and as "a friend to colonialism":
Official PA TV host: "The establishment of Israel was not a Jewish project, but rather a Zionist project at the initiative of the Zionist bourgeoisie that was all an appendix of the European and American capitalism. The first who suggested turning this into a realistic fact was [former] British Prime Minister [Sir Henry Campbell-] Bannerman (see note below). At the start of a European conference at the start of the 20th century, he said: 'The European civilization is under threat of disintegration and extinction, and it is our duty to find an effective way to prevent its collapse.' Then the conference arrived at a plan that requires thwarting any unification or agreement between the Middle East countries because they constitute the only threat to the future of Europe, and the means of achieving this [solution to the problem] is establishing an external national entity that is foreign to the region, hostile to its residents, and a friend to colonialism."
[Official PA TV, The Philosophy of Endurance, Oct. 26, 2024]
A former PA Security Forces major general stressed that it was Britain that led "the theft" of "Palestine" for the benefit of the "large colonialist project":
PA Security Forces Maj. Gen. (ret.) and national security expert Ahmed Issa: "Israel is the only state that was not established by its people on its land. It was established through theft, and it is a product of a large colonialist project led by the colonialist states under the leadership of Britain."
[Official PA TV, Israel in the News, Oct. 28, 2024]
Abbas' Fatah Movement sees itself as engaging in "the struggle" ever since in order to "liberate Palestine" from "colonialism":
Fatah Revolutionary Council member Ahmed Ghneim: "This revolutionary [Fatah] leadership constituted the backbone of Fatah and played a decisive role in the resolution of the Palestinian people against the Israeli occupation, in addition to its central role in developing the strategy of Fatah, which has not stopped aspiring to liberate the Palestinian territories from colonialism."
[Al-Quds, Jan. 7, 2025]
Similarly, a regular columnist for the official PA daily claimed that "Israel is a tool for the Crusader states" and all the American administrations:
Regular columnist for official PA daily Omar Hilmi Al-Ghoul: "Israel is a tool… which is pushing towards turning the conflict from a political, economic, cultural, and social conflict into a religious conflict. The Crusader states, which still have the idea of settling accounts with the Arabs and Muslims nesting in their minds, are still continuing to revolve around [this idea]. Trump speaks about the War of Gog and Magog, about Armageddon, as so too [former US President] Bush the son and [former US President] Bush the father, and all the American administrations. A large portion of the capitalist Western states speak this way."
[Official PA TV, Sept. 24, 2024]
Muwaffaq Matar, who is a member of Fatah's Revolutionary Council and also a regular columnist for the official PA daily, echoed Al-Ghoul when he wrote that Israel "was artificially grown (through a test tube)" and that Israel's actions and its "fanning of the religious and ethnic conflicts and civil wars between Arabs" are proof that the West created Israel to cripple the Arab world:
"The occupation system (the State of Israel), which was artificially grown (through a test tube) [both parentheses in source], was fundamentally established based on the decision of leaders of colonialist states…They discussed ways to ensure their rule over the Arab peoples… They wrote…: 'Let us bring groups of residents that are friendly to us and plant them in the region east of the Suez Canal,' in other words, in Palestine. These words contain the secret of Israel, which the presidents and kings of the colonialist states know…
'Let us bring Jews who are friendly to us to Palestine.' As for their goals, the honored reader… can analyze the goals of the great colonialists according to what Israel has done and is doing in Palestine and in the Arab states near and far. [He can analyze] how the governments of political and religious Zionism alike have done much on everything concerning fanning the religious and ethnic conflicts and civil wars between Arabs, and everything concerning leaving the Arab states in a state of wars that annihilate their energy, resources, and capabilities."
[Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida website, Oct. 20, 2024]
This was seconded by yet another writer at the official PA daily, Hassan Hmeid, who stated that Israel "is an artificial entity, established by the decision of the West." He further expressed his anticipation of Israel's "cessation and extinction":
"The truth that is as obvious and clear as a golden sun on a clear summer day is that the Israeli entity is an artificial entity, which was established by the decision of the West, and which currently is being sponsored and defended according to the will of the West and its policy… We must not hang hopes on the West, which is siding with the Israeli barbarism, but we know that the end of the Israeli entity's power is cessation and extinction, while those who will remain are the people of culture, the people of civilization."
[Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida website, Oct. 27, 2024]
Later, after US President Trump had announced his plan for the Gaza Strip, including relocation of "refugees" (see note below), columnist Matar added that:
"Unwanted 'Zionist Jews' in Europe were chosen to occupy Palestine and settle in it, aiming to use them as a colonialist proxy and prevent the revival of the peoples in the region!"
[Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Feb. 11, 2025]
Palestinian Media Watch reported on a column in the official PA daily in which the writer compared "the colonial West" to the Greek god Zeus giving Israel/Pandora a box of weapons that Israel opened and that now sows death and destruction in the world.
Representatives from the PLO also support this demonizing false Palestinian narrative. Director of the PLO's Arab Relations Anwar Abd Al-Hadi recently referred to Israel as "a state that someone put together":
PLO Arab Relations Director Anwar Abd Al-Hadi: "Israel has no roots in the ground. Israel is a state that someone put together, a state that the West created. A state that is comprised of people with 90 citizenships. Therefore, if Israel will not give the Palestinian people what it deserves, there will be an explosion inside Israel."
[Official PA TV, Capital of Capitals – Damascus, Nov. 17, 2024]
A covert reference to Israel as a colonial power was made by a PA district governor, who said that "Palestine will be liberated like it was liberated from the yoke of the ancient colonialist powers":
Salfit District Governor Abdallah Kmeil: "Palestine will be liberated after years of oppression. This land will be liberated like it was liberated in the past from the yoke of the ancient colonialist powers and the empires that occupied Palestine. The empires left, the Mongols left, the Romans and the Crusaders left – and Palestine and the Palestinian people remained."
[Official PA TV, Giants of Endurance, Dec. 27, 2024]
Along the same lines, another PLO official demanded that Jews "return to their origins in Europe and other states from which they came":
PLO Representative to the UN and International Organizations in Geneva Ibrahim Khreisheh: "Israel is an occupying state, and it needs to end its occupation… We as a Palestinian people have been suffering from this occupation for 57 years until now... Now they (i.e., Israelis /Jews) are talking about historical Palestine from the [Mediterranean] Sea to the [Jordan] River, and later they will talk about [something] even bigger. They think according to the religious stories that Greater Israel from the Nile [River] to [the Euphrates River in] Iraq is the land of Greater Israel. Most of them came from various nations and ethnic groups from Europe and other states and stole the Palestinian land. Historically speaking, we the Palestinians are Jews, Christians, and Muslims. We have lived in this land for thousands of years, and Palestinians were there before all the religions. Therefore, those who claim their ‘historical right' (i.e., the Jews) need to return to their origins in Europe and other states from which they came. Palestine will remain for the Palestinians."
[Official PA TV News, Oct. 12, 2024]
In November 2024, at the Mediterranean Dialogues Conference in Rome, Rawhi Fattouh, the chairman of the Palestinian National Council (the legislative body of the PLO), got up and left a "dialogue meeting" upon seeing that Israeli Parliament Member Yuli Edelstein was also participating, explaining he did so because he refused to "sit with a colonialist who steals lands":
"Chairman of the National Council [Fattouh] cut short the dialogue meeting and resigned from it in protest over the presence of colonialist [Israeli Parliament Member] Yuli Edelstein, who arrived as a representative of the Israeli Parliament... Fattouh submitted to the participants and the Italian Parliament a protest letter in which he clarified that one should not sit with a colonialist who steals lands, violates international law, and intimidates the native residents, as this completely contradicts the spirit and principles of the conference, whose title is peace and stability."
[Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Nov. 28, 2024]
The following are longer excerpts of the statements cited above and additional reports:
The video in which Advisor to Head of The Committee to Resist Settlements and the Wall Ayed Morrar says Israel was created as "a hostile entity and a friend to colonialism"is part of a series that has been broadcast on official PA TV dozens of times since 2018.
Excerpt of a column by Muwaffaq Matar, Fatah Revolutionary Council member and regular columnist for the official PA daily
"The occupation system (the state of Israel) [parentheses in source], which was artificially grown (through a test tube) [parentheses in source], was fundamentally established based on the decision of leaders of colonialist states. For three years they discussed ways to ensure their rule over the Arab peoples of the eastern and southern Mediterranean Sea, and Palestine at their center, until they reached the conclusion that they anchored in the Campbell [-Bannerman] Document in 1905 (sic., see note below regarding PA conspiracy theory on "the Campbell-Bannerman plan"), when they wrote in their document: ‘Let us bring groups of residents that are friendly to us and plant them in the region east of the Suez Canal,' in other words, in Palestine. These words contain the secret of Israel, which the presidents and kings of the colonialist states know…
Even the US presidents understand this secret, even though they did not participate in the 1,000-day meetings, at the end of which it was decided: ‘Let us bring Jews who are friendly to us to Palestine.' As for their goals, the honored reader can learn their details in the contents of the Campbell Document, but he can analyze the goals of the great colonialists according to what Israel has done and is doing in Palestine and in the Arab states near and far. [He can analyze] how the governments of political and religious Zionism alike have done much on everything concerning fanning the religious and ethnic conflicts and civil wars between Arabs, and everything concerning leaving the Arab states in a state of wars that annihilate their energy, resources, and capabilities…
The UN General Assembly should have negated its recognition of Israel, because it is not upholding its commitments, is defying the human principles upon which the peoples and nations in this international organization have agreed, and worse than this – is burning all its resolutions and laws with the fire of wars that it has created, and massacres that it has committed against the defenseless Palestinian people, that latest of which is the bloody and destructive campaign of annihilation that has reached its peak in the Gaza Strip (refers to the 2023 Gaza war; see note below -Ed.)."
[Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida website, Oct. 20, 2024]
Excerpt of a column by Hassan Hmeid, a Palestinian writer from Damascus
Headline: "The people of civilization are the ones who will remain!"
"The truth that is as obvious and clear as a golden sun on a clear summer day is that the Israeli entity is an artificial entity, which was established by the decision of the West, and which currently is being sponsored and defended according to the will of the West and its policy…
Currently a genocide is being committed in our Palestinian land (refers to the 2023 Gaza war; see note below -Ed.), with lethal Western weapons by the Israelis and the mercenaries that they brought in with temptations. It is being committed before the TV cameras, and no one in the Western countries is doing anything but watch, as if what is happening in the Palestinian Gaza Strip and West Bank is a circus act and nothing more…
Therefore, we know that we must not hang hopes on the West, which is siding with the Israeli barbarism, but we know that the end of the Israeli entity's power is cessation and extinction, while those who will remain are the people of culture, the people of civilization."
[Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida website, Oct. 27, 2024]
"Yesterday, Wednesday, [Nov. 27, 2024,] Palestinian National Council (i.e., the legislative body of the PLO) Chairman Rawhi Fattouh met with Chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee in the Italian Chamber of Deputies Giulio Tremonti, President of the Foreign Affairs [Committee] in the Italian Senate Stefania Craxi, and the Committee for Peace Between Palestine and Israel in the Italian Parliament.
Fattouh presented the barbaric massacres and severe violations committed by the Israeli occupation army and the settler herds, under the instructions of the extremist right-wing government that does not respect any international laws or peace.
He warned of [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu's plan to expel the Palestinians from the Gaza Strip to the Sinai Desert, which is a most dangerous Israeli plan that the international parties are required to combat. He emphasized that the world's states and parliaments need to collaborate to stop this despicable war (refers to the 2023 Gaza war; see note below -Ed.) and punish Israel for its crimes against humanity.
Fattouh said that the war against the Gaza Strip is the most violent war known to modern history, and that during it the Israeli occupation and its fascist government are murdering whoever stands in their way – civilians, innocents, women, children, and the elderly, preventing them from receiving aid, and not allowing its entry, especially to the northern Gaza Strip that is suffering from hunger.
He demanded to urgently recognize the independent State of Palestine whose capital is East Jerusalem, in order to maintain the two-state solution...
On the sidelines of the [MED] Mediterranean Dialogues [Conference] that is taking place in Rome, Fattouh discussed with the Italian Parliament and Senate ways to strengthen the parliamentary relations between Palestine and Italy. Chairman of the National Council [Fattouh] cut short the dialogue meeting and resigned from it in protest over the presence of colonialist [Israeli Parliament Member] Yuli Edelstein, who arrived as a representative of the Israeli Parliament...
Fattouh submitted to the participants and the Italian Parliament a protest letter in which he clarified that one should not sit with a colonialist who steals lands, violates international law, and intimidates the native residents, as this completely contradicts the spirit and principles of the conference, whose title is peace and stability. He said that Edelstein is a war criminal whose place is in the International Criminal Court (ICC) to give an accounting for his crimes, not in a conference on peace, because it is impossible to build peace with the enemies of peace. Fattouh demanded that the organizers respect international law, and he called on the participants to refuse to grant a platform to war criminals in the parliaments and international arenas."
[Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Nov. 28, 2024]
Excerpt of a column by Omar Hilmi Al-Ghoul, PLO Central Council member and regular columnist for official PA daily
Headline: "Changing names does not nullify the facts"
"A struggle of wills is taking place between the native people and the invading colonialists and those who stand behind them – particularly if this colonialism is of the ugliest and most barbaric kind, and is based on the expulsion [of the original residents] and settling [settlers in their place], in other words, the deportation and ethnic cleansing of the people who own the land, the history, and the cultural heritage; on the replacement of the history and names of regions, cities, villages, and streets with fabricated names that have no connection to the historical names; on an effort to falsify every symbol of the Palestinian national identity or appropriate it; and on the theft of the cultural heritage, folklore, attire, and popular dishes (sic., see note below)…
But its colonialist plan will shatter on the rock of the heroic resolve of the people who own the land and history…
In accordance with this trend, the Israeli Parliament ratified a bill to change the name of the West Bank to the Zionist-Jewish name ‘Judea and Samaria' (i.e., the historical name of the region from biblical times), which was submitted by Israeli Parliament Member Simcha Rothman of the Religious Zionist party...
No matter how they change and falsify names and concepts, and how they attempt to steal the history and stage a coup against it, their criminal plans are destined to fail."
[Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, March 1, 2025]
Note: The Palestinians have no history prior to the modern period.
Excerpt of a column by Muwaffaq Matar, Fatah Revolutionary Council member and regular columnist for the official PA daily
Headline: "Renewing the colonialist projects – and the price!"
"The uprooting plan and the idea of acquiring the Gaza Strip (i.e., 2025 Trump plan for Gaza; see note below -Ed.) are the sudden danger that truly threatens our future and our existence on our homeland. The proposed projects and plans aim to uproot more than two million Palestinian civilians from the Gaza Strip, in a serious attempt to reproduce the 1905 Campbell Document (sic., see note below regarding PA conspiracy theory on "the Campbell-Bannerman plan"), when unwanted ‘Zionist Jews' in Europe were chosen in order to occupy Palestine and settle in it, aiming to use them as a colonialist proxy and prevent the revival of the peoples in the region! ...
The destructive and bloody annihilation, for which Hamas provided its agent [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu the excuses to carry out (i.e., Hamas' invasion and massacre to launch its terror war on Israel; see note below -Ed.)... The talk of ‘purchasing the land of the Gaza Strip,' and the reconstruction (colonialism) plan [parentheses in source] ("reconstruction" and "colonialism" are very similar in Arabic and share the same word root -Ed.) but without native residents, such as turning Gaza into ‘the riviera of the Middle East' under the management of the racist settlers – all these are nothing but a return to the logic of the Sykes-Picot states (see note below -Ed.), the colonialist mandate states, which laid out the theoretical infrastructure and the foundations that were necessary in advance for the establishment of the state of occupation and settlement (Israel) [parentheses in source] over 100 years ago."
[Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Feb. 11, 2025]