June
18, 2003, 8:45 a.m.
Defeat Terrorism First
Then create
a new Palestinian state.
By Tashbih
Sayyed
year ago, President Bush said he wanted to help Palestinians create "a
practicing democracy, based on tolerance and liberty." A month ago,
he told Arab leaders in Sharm al-Sheikh, Egypt that "We must not
allow…a few terrorists to destroy the dreams and hopes of the many."
If it only it
were that simple. The sad truth, however, is that those "murderers
and attackers" are today heroes of Palestinian society. Opinion polls
in the past three years consistently show that over 60 percent of Palestinians
support bombings and violence inside Israel. Suicide/homicide bombers are
held up as role models in schools and mosques. City plazas and stadiums
are named after them. Their pictures are plastered all over the walls of
Gaza and proudly displayed in their parents' living rooms. Children are
encouraged by teachers and authority figures to follow in their footsteps
and sacrifice themselves for the Palestinian cause. All day long, Palestinian
Authority television broadcasts videos that show "martyrs" being
greeted by beautiful "virgins" in the fountains of heaven, their
reward for killing Jews. And when a Palestinian terrorist, with more than
a dozen murders on his hands, was recently released from prison by Israel
as a good will gesture, Yasser Arafat celebrated his return and named him
a top adviser.
Terrorists not only benefit from wide support through Palestinian society,
they embody only too well the deepest hopes of the majority: to destroy
the Jewish state. Over 50 percent of Palestinians say that the goal of this
intifada is not a two-state solution, but the destruction of Israel —
referred to as "ending the occupation of territories lost in 1948."
The children and grandchildren of Palestinian refugees who have been made
second class citizens in Lebanon, Syria, or the Gulf States (nations which
refuse to grant them citizenship or equal rights) cling to the illusion
that defeating the Jews will restore their dignity.
This mindset is no accident. It is the result of over 50 years of relentless
indoctrination. Arab dictators, the PLO and radical Islamist movements have
used the media, mosques and universities to present Jews as unholy intruders,
occupiers, murderers, and enemies of Islam. It is the result of an orchestrated
effort to transform as many Palestinians as possible into revenge-seeking,
hate-filled souls. Terrorism has been misrepresented by extremist leaders
as a form of jihad, and presented as the path to Palestinian redemption.
The Palestinian narrative of oppression at the hands of "foreign occupiers"
ignores the deep historic, religious, and cultural ties that bind the Jewish
nation to Jerusalem and the Holy Land. Arafat has repeatedly said in public
that there never was a Jewish temple in Jerusalem.
While the overwhelming majority of Jews, over 70 percent according to opinion
polls, have gradually come to recognize a Palestinian right to self-determination,
the Palestinian national movement continues to this day to oppose Jewish
self-determination. The Hamas Charter and Hezbollah's literature make no
secret of their desire to destroy the Jewish state. Arafat clearly makes
common cause with Hamas, not least by authorizing his Al Aksa Martyrs Brigade
to participate with Hamas in terrorist operations. Even the new Palestinian
Authority prime minister, Mahmoud Abbas, dares not say he accepts Israel
as a Jewish state.
To create a Palestinian state before this mindset is changed can only ensure
that the new state will be yet another terrorist sponsor. And that will
have much broader consequences than merely empowering Palestinians to continue
their genocidal campaign against Jews in the Middle East. Such a victory
would galvanize Islamist terrorist movements worldwide.
Islamist terrorists, having lost their base in Afghanistan, have now returned
to their local and regional workstations. They are well entrenched and gaining
strength. While they may not be under one unified command, they find unity
in their common dream: To defeat and dominate infidels — Jews, Christians,
and moderate Muslims alike. "Palestine" is seen as among their
most important and promising battlefields.
Palestinian terrorist movements have successfully connected the Arab-Israeli
conflict with the militant Islamists' goal of establishing a global caliphate
(Islamic rule). Convinced that the Jewish state is a conspiracy to weaken
Islam, they are driven by the sense that the honor of their faith depends
on the outcome of this battle. Just as the humiliation of losing the Ottoman
Empire in 1924 has become associated in the Muslim psyche with the "shame"
of the establishment of Israel, militant Muslims worldwide believe that
destroying the Jewish state will once and for all reopen the road to their
eternal domination of other faiths.
If Palestinians, Arabs, and Muslims worldwide see a Palestinian state created
before the terrorist movements and extremist ideologies are discredited
and defeated, they will be convinced that terrorism succeeds where other
approaches have failed. That can only engender more terrorism, directed
not only at Israel but also at the United States and the rest of the free
world.
<% dim printurl
printurl = Request.ServerVariables("URL")%>
year ago, President Bush said he wanted to help Palestinians create "a
practicing democracy, based on tolerance and liberty." A month ago,
he told Arab leaders in Sharm al-Sheikh, Egypt that "We must not
allow…a few terrorists to destroy the dreams and hopes of the many."
