The Left's Support for Palestinian Terror
By J.D. Cassidy
February 24, 2003  http://www.frontpagemag.com/articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=6304

Among the myriad of anti-American causes that have spilled into the leftwing cesspool known as the "peace movement," support for the bloodthirsty Palestinians is perhaps the most disgusting. To the left-wing America-haters who constitute the new "anti-war" movement, being "pro-Palestine" somehow translates into being "anti-war." Never mind the fact that the Muslim radicals who attacked America on 9-11 used Palestinian suicide bombings in Israel as a model for their sinister plot. The American left views Palestinian radicals as "freedom fighters," therefore liberating "Palestine" has become one of the central battles of the new "anti-war" movement.

To ensure that fledgling radicals know which position to take in regard to the Arab-Israeli war, the website of the Workers World Party (WWP)- the Stalinist cult that bankrolls the current "peace" movement- lays out plainly how all good lefties should view Israel. The website contains hundreds of articles filled with anti-Jew vitriol, and loathsome denunciations of the "Imperialist" Jewish state. Another radical organization that is active in the "peace" movement actually arranges for leftwing malcontents to travel from America to Israel. There, the radical Jew-haters carry out plots to sabotage the Israeli Army's peacekeeping efforts. The group's website boasts photographs of the left-wing thugs whom it sponsors engaged in physical confrontations with Israeli soldiers. This dangerous organization, called "The International Solidarity Movement," has chapters in Massachusetts, New Jersey, Michigan, Washington and Sweden.

The movement to "liberate Palestine" is a movement that defines itself by its hatred of Jews and a violent desire to spill their blood. The American and international left, however, chooses to ignore this cold fact. It instead throws its weight behind the Palestinian "liberation movement" because it believes that the Palestinians are "oppressed" by the Israelis, whom the left considers agents of "Western Imperialism." The left believes that the warfare in Israel is a "cycle of violence," rather than an offensive terrorist war against Israeli civilians. It believes that Israeli soldiers are to blame for the ongoing warfare- that when the Israeli military moves into a Palestinian village to root out terrorists, it is not attempting to stop future terrorist attacks but is instead taking "revenge" on out-gunned Palestinians. The left has been on the wrong side of every important issue in history. Its position on the Arab-Israeli war is no exception. The best way to understand what it means to be "pro-Palestine" is to look at the agenda of the Arab organizations that are working for "Palestinian liberation." Since its inception, the PLO has taken part in hundreds of terrorist attacks against Israelis. In recent years, Arafat has paid lip service to a Palestinian desire for peace, but the PLO's ambition to drive the Jews into the sea continues. Consider, for example, a statement that Arafat made in the aftermath of a recent suicide attack in which 27 Israeli civilians were slaughtered at a Passover celebration. Referring to this attack, the bloodthirsty Arafat prayed: "Oh God, give me martyrdom like this. We are all potential martyrs, the whole Palestinian people." In a similar statement, the PLO Chairman stated in January 1995: "We are going to continue the Palestinian revolution until the last martyr to create a Palestinian state." Again, in September 1995 the Palestinian leader declared: "By Allah I swear that the Palestinian people are prepared to sacrifice the last boy and the last girl so that the Palestinian flag will be flown over the walls, the churches, and the mosques of Jerusalem."

Arafat's statements are right in line with the attitude towards Jewry that prevails among Arab leaders and officials. In a letter to President Bush and the United States Congress, a member of the Consultative Council of Saudi Arabia, named Amhed al-Tuwaijri, actually had the gall to openly defend suicide bombings. In the letter, dated April 16, 2002, the Saudi official writes: "When young men and women offered their souls for the sake of freedom and independence and in defense of their religion, dignity, self and family, the United States could not find anything to describe these great sacrifices except to say they are terrorist, criminal actions." I suppose it should not be surprising that a Saudi official would make such a horrific statement. Saudi Arabia, after all, is a nation that recently held a telethon, during which one hundred million dollars was raised for Palestinian suicide bombers.

Support and encouragement for suicide attacks against innocent Israelis is also commonplace among Palestinian clergy. On April 12, 2002, in a televised sermon that was delivered from a mosque in Gaza City, an Imam of the Palestinian Authority unleashed the following message to his Arab disciples: "Anyone who does not attain martyrdom in these days should wake in the middle of the night and say: 'My God, why have you deprived me of martyrdom for your sake? For the martyr lives next to Allah.'" He then continued:

"Oh Allah, accept our martyrs in the highest heaven."

"Oh Allah, show the Jews a black day."

"Oh Allah, annihilate the Jews and their supporters."

"Oh Allah, raise the flag of Jihad across the land."

Not only do Arabs encounter suicidal messages in their mosques, but Palestinian children are actually bred, through schooling, to rejoice in the slaughter of innocent Jews. Consider the following line excerpted from a Palestinian schoolbook, "I will take my soul into my hands and hurl it into the abyss of death." Or this line, taken from another textbook: "Beware of the Jews, for they are treacherous and disloyal." Or this line from the PLO teachers guide, which is placed under the heading "important values" that should be instilled in Palestinian youth: "Wrath to the alien thief [Israel] who obliterated the Homeland and dispersed its people."

It doesn't take a rocket scientist to see that the Palestinian liberation movement is about killing Jews. There is no effective voice of moderation among the Palestinian leadership or clergy. There is nobody in the Palestinian community who is effectively promoting a peaceful solution to the Arab-Israeli war. To the terrorist organizations that are leading the movement to "liberate Palestine," the possibility of living side by side with Jews is unthinkable. In their minds, the Jews are infidels who deserve to be driven from the Middle East through a bloody Jihad.

To put this all into perspective it is necessary to look at the historical roots of the Palestinians' war against Israel. Prior to the First World War, what is today called Israel was part of the Ottoman Empire and was known as Palestine- though it was not considered the "nation" of Palestine. Nor were the Arabs who lived there considered "Palestinians." They were considered- and they considered themselves-"Arabs." In the aftermath of WWI, the Ottoman Empire, which had allied with Germany, was divided up among the British and French victors. The area then known as Palestine came under British rule. During this period, the area known as Palestine experienced an influx of European Jews.

In the wake of the holocaust, a movement for a Jewish nation-state garnered support from the United Nations. Throughout the 1930s, as the rise of Hitler catalyzed intensive Jewish immigration to the area of Palestine, tensions between Jews and Arabs escalated and two attempts by the British, in 1937 and in 1939, to divide the land between Arabs and Jews were rejected. The Arabs rejected the first attempt, and the Jews rejected the second attempt, which would have restricted the rights of Jews to immigrate and own land.

At the close of World War II, an acceleration of fighting between Jews and Arabs in this area prompted Britain's decision to turn the problem over to the United Nations, which supported the creation of a Jewish state. On May 14, 1948, Britain officially withdrew from the area and Israel was declared a nation. On this very day, five neighboring Arab countries- Egypt, Lebanon, Trans-Jordan, Iraq and Syria attacked Israel. Amazingly, the outnumbered Jewish nation was able to beat back its Arab foes and a peace treaty was signed in 1949. When the war ended, Egypt was in control of the Gaza Strip and Trans-Jordan had annexed the West Bank (these territories were later won by Israel in the 1967 war).

Though two-thirds of the Arabs in Israel chose to leave the infant nation, a full one-third of the Arabs remained. Those who stayed were granted citizenship by the Israel government and to this day enjoy greater rights than any of the Arabs living in Arab-ruled nations. The Arabs who became Israeli citizens, along with their offspring, have benefited tremendously. In 1948, to cite one significant example, Arab illiteracy in Israel was 95 percent. Today, it is a mere 5 percent. Because the neighboring Arab countries would not allow citizenship to the Arabs who left Israel, they instead became "refugees." To this day, they are forced to live in refugee camps, which are terrorist breeding grounds, simply because their "Arab brothers" in surrounding nations refuse to grant them citizenship.

The Palestinian Liberation Organization (PL0) was formed in 1964. From the outset, the PLO stated that its ultimate goal is to drive the Jews into the sea. The destruction of the state of Israel was actually laid out plainly in the PLO Charter until PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat ordered it removed in 1993. Arafat, however, still wears the official sign of the PLO - a map of the future state of Palestine - on the sleeve of his military uniform. This map shows Palestine encompassing the entire land of Israel. This is the goal of the PLO: to destroy Israel and replace it with an Arab nation called "Palestine." Among the leadership of the Palestinian liberation movement Yasser Arafat is actually a moderate voice. This is a man who funds terrorism and publicly encourages (in Arabic) his followers to carry out suicide attacks against innocent, defenseless Israeli men, women and children. Arafat is a man who walked away from peace talks in 2000 after then-Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak offered to give the Palestinians 95% of the land that they demanded. Arafat did not accept Israel's concession for one reason: in Arafat's words, "Peace for us means the destruction of Israel."

Until terrorist groups like Hezbollah, Hamas and the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade are brought to heel; until the PLO ceases funding and encouraging terrorism; until there is a deep change in the cultural attitudes of Palestinians, the Arab war against Israeli will persist. Innocent Israeli civilians will continue to be blown to pieces by Jew-hating Muslim radicals; children will continue to be incinerated in their school buses; babies will continue to die in their strollers on city sidewalks; old men and women will continue to be slaughtered by madmen in street-side cafes. These are the realities of the Palestinian "liberation movement." The next time that a Western "peace" demonstrator feels compelled to pick up a Palestinian flag and wave it in the air, he should take a look at the news photos of Jewish bodies strewn across Israeli streets and think about what he is actually supporting.