Article on PA antisemitism cites PMW documentation
The Jews should be offended too
by Yaakov Ahimeir
Perhaps we Jews should also be insulted. Perhaps we should be profoundly insulted, just like the crowds of extremist Muslim protesters who attacked American embassies across the Arab world and murdered the American ambassador to Libya and three additional staffers in Benghazi. All this as a result of a pitiful film mocking the Prophet Muhammad.
As Jews, we are faced with insults and foul language on a daily basis, and we always take the high road. We do not choose to react in a barbaric manner, as the Muslim extremists who murdered and destroyed U.S. property did while burning the American flag, along with the Israeli one of course. We do not charge and set fire to the property of Palestinian delegations overseas. Jews living outside Israel do not react violently. But has any Muslim leader come out against the generalizing insults thrown at the Jewish people?
The insults hurled at the Jewish people are not limited to extremists within the Muslim world: The Palestinian Authority uses disgusting language in the Palestinian media, which is under its control, to insult the Jewish people. A Palestinian Authority youth magazine recently published a young Palestinian woman's account of a dream she had in which Hitler tells her: "Yes, I murdered them [Jews] so that you all will know that they are a nation that spreads worldwide destruction."
Palestinian Authority television describes Jewish prayer conducted at the Western Wall as "a sin and filth." A Palestinian academic official depicted Jews as "parasitical worms." Then there is the Palestinian clerk from the Religious Affairs Ministry who compared Jews to "pigs roaming the land." All these instances are documented by the Israeli NGO Palestinian Media Watch.
Where can we find reports of this terrible name-calling? Only rarely are such incidents covered by the Israeli media, which, in the spirit of political correctness, avoids showcasing such hateful events. Who does quote these remarks or publicize all this verbal filth? An Israeli reporter? An Israeli diplomat? No. Not at all.
Others, however, do refer to such degrading comments. One such person is former Australian Ambassador to Israel Ian Wilcock, who discussed the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in an opinion piece in The Australian.
Wilcock warned that if the Palestinian Authority was serious about reaching a two-state solution, it had to "have the courage to stop its poisonous, racist characterizations of Jews." He went on to say that spreading such filth, both verbally and in writing, serves to undermine Israel's faith in the Palestinians, both of which will be returning to the negotiating table one day. He said he supported the Palestinians and the two-state solution.
Has anyone heard any condemnations recently of these anti-Semitic rants on behalf of the Palestinian Authority or any presidents or foreign ministers of any first-world nations?
It seems that the racism that appears in some of the Palestinian media is widely ignored. It is, after all, about Jews. The same people who are behind a worldwide conspiracy to rule the world. That is how we are described in the “Protocols of the Elders of Zion,” the same false, anti-Semitic document regularly used by the Palestinian Authority to promote its own ideology. In any case, this is how Wilcock sees it. He, at least, voices shock and is flattering in an article he wrote for Palestinian Media Watch.
Our reasons for being offended are just as good as the reasons cited by those who murdered U.S. Ambassador to Libya Christopher Stevens. We just decide to react differently.