- Engineering civilian casualties - Jerusalem Post, June 2, 2004
- Blaming Israel for child bombers? - National Post [Canada], April 8, 2004
- Dangerous misconception - OttawaCitizen, March 28, 2004
- It's A spiration, not Desperation - Jerusalem Post Op-Ed & the National Post (Canada), January 29, 2004
- Pedagogy of Hate - Jerusalem Post, January 4, 2004
- PMW Director Itamar Marcus Testifies at US Senate Hearing
- Promoting Women Terrorists - JPost, Oct. 9, 2003
- Teaching Israeli Arabs to Love Only "Palestine"- JPost,Sept. 12, 2003
- Seven Minutes of Peace Promotion - Jerusalem Post, July 18, 2003
- Planting Seeds of War - Jerusalem Post, June 29, 2003
- Palestinian
Words Since Aqaba - More Telling than Deeds -
Jerusalem Post, June 20, 2003 - Islamic Law and Islamic Terror - A lecture to the American Bar Association, Conference on International Law, May 9, 2002
- Lies,
Libels and Historical Revisionism in the Palestinian Authority -
Makor Rishon, February 22, 2001 -
Pedagogy of Hate
Itamar Marcus and Barbara Crook
If you want to know what's really at the heart of the Palestinian conflict with Israel, don't ask the politicians or the diplomats. Go to the new experts: Palestinian children. Unlike the rest of the world, they've been paying close attention to what their leaders and educators have been teaching them and they are ready to practice what they have been taught.For instance, children interviewed on PA TV last week state clearly and without reservation that Israel has no right to exist, and that their goals for which they're willing to sacrifice their lives is Israel's destruction and the expulsion of all Israelis.
"They [the Jews] came to take Palestine, that is Tel-Aviv, Jaffa, Haifa, Acco, Ramle. All these cities belong to Palestine," one youth explains in the broadcast, echoing years of standard Palestinian Authority (PA) indoctrination. And because he is convinced that Israel has no right to exist: "We hope, hope, hope and I emphasize these things, that the Arab countries and the foreign countries, all the countries of the world, will support the Palestinians and will expel the Israelis."
"We must expel all Israelis from Palestine. Because Israel - there is nothing called 'Israel' in the world. The Israelis [came] from Holland, America, Iran."
The children are seen promising they will keep fighting, generation after generation, "until they liberate Palestine."
Furthermore, they don't fear death in the struggle because it is Shahada - Death for Allah. "Even if all the Palestinian children, Palestinian youth, Palestinian women, and Palestinian men die, we will not surrender!"
None of this is surprising to anyone who has been paying attention to what goes on in the PA educational system and its educational TV. Israel is erased from PA maps, schoolbooks and historians deny Israel's history and right to exist, and educators at all levels teach that Israel is a foreign colonial implant.
Despite PA claims to the contrary, its textbooks continue to delegitimize Israel and dismiss it as a foreign occupier: "Palestine faced the British occupation after the First World War in 1917, and the Israeli occupation in 1948." [National Education, Sixth Grade, p. 16]. Children are taught that all of Israel is part of "Palestine". For example: "Among the famous rocks of southern Palestine are the rocks of Beersheba and the Negev." About "Palestine's" water sources children are taught: "The most important is the Sea of Galilee..." [Our Beautiful Language, Grade 6, Part A, p. 64; National Education, Sixth Grade, pp. 9-10].
Such messages of delegitimization have been affirmed by Prime Minister Ahmad Qurei. He is on record as rejecting the idea of Israel as a Jewish state. "President Bush said that Israel is a Jewish state, which is a cause for our concern. This should not have been said." [Al-Nahar-Lebanese and Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, June 15, 2003].
PA affiliated historians frequently appear on educational TV to reinforce this message. Just last week historian and educational TV host Dr. Isam Sisalem reiterated what he has said on numerous broadcasts, that Jews " . . . have no history or connection to this land" iut and are nothing but a "cancer" planted by Britain to control the Middle East.
In the same educational broadcast last week, another historian resurrected The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, the infamous anti-Semitic forgery citing it as one of the foundations of the First Zionist Congress in 1897.
"...The Zionist movement began at the Basel Congress to plan the exploitation of the powers struggle, and the struggle of Europe over the Middle East..." said Dr. Riad Al-Astal, a history lecturer at Al-Azhar University in Gaza.
Consequently when we view children on PATV who say they want to destroy Israel, to liberate "Tel-Aviv, Jaffa, Haifa, Acco, and Ramle," and to expel the Jews, we are seeing children who are accurately regurgitating the sentiments inculcated and reinforced throughout PA society.
Indeed, years of anti-Israel indoctrination have been alarmingly effective in teaching PA youth that the Jews have no link to Israel, that Israel has no right to exist and that the overriding goal of the next generation -- even at the cost of their lives -- should be to eliminate Israel.
The essence of the conflict is Israel's very right to exist -- not the question of borders, territories or refugees`. Peace negotiations that do not address the PA's educational system and its indoctrination will be short-term paper agreements doomed to failure.
Palestinian children have already figured this out. Perhaps the rest of us need to stay after school.
Itamar Marcus, director of Palestinian Media Watch (PMW). Barbara Crook, a writer and university lecturer based in Ottawa, Canada, is PMW's North American representative.
PMW Director Itamar Marcus
Testifies at US Senate Hearing
- PMW Documentary Screened at the Hearing
October 31, 2003 -
Introduction Jerusalem Post Op-Ed, June 2, 2004: Engineering
civilian casualties It could have been an invitation to a social event, calling for "all citizens - women, children and the elderly" to participate. But the venue was anything but hospitable. The event was dangerous and the consequences deadly. Two days before four Palestinian civilians were killed and others injured during the recent fighting in Rafah, the Palestinian Authority called on women, children and the elderly to stand in front of the IDF bulldozers that were searching for weapons tunnels between Gaza and Egypt. The area was infested with terrorists, and was the location of heavy fighting between the IDF and armed Palestinians. Instead of urging civilians to stay out of harm's way, the PA intentionally sent them to the front lines of an active war zone. In the words of the official Palestinian Authority daily, the call was to create "an impassable barrier for the occupation bulldozers" and to "prevent their progress to the Rafah neighborhoods." The principal of a school in Rafah "called for all the citizens, women, children and elderly to participate" according to the May 17, Al Ayyam newspaper. The call was answered. Thousands of civilians marched into the heart of the battle zone. Tragically, this is not the first time the PA has urged civilians into combat zones. It is part of a consistent and disturbing pattern. Since the outbreak of violence in October 2000, the PA has been pushing civilians, especially children, to leave the safety of their homes and join the fighting. Children have been enticed into battle through manipulative music videos, broadcast for hours every day on official PA television, depicting youngsters in combat as heroes. One such video, broadcast repeatedly by the PA, shows young boys and girls in army uniform taking part in a frenzied war dance, along with other scenes of children participating in the violence at the battlefront. The song accompanying the visuals is a musical call to arms for the children: "Oh, young ones: Shake the earth, raise the stones. "You will not be saved, O Zionist, From the volcano of my county's stones. "You
are the target of my eyes, I will even willingly fall as a shahid
[martyr for Allah]. Children are directed by Palestinian television to go to the front and "willingly fall" as martyrs. In this glorification of war for children, even a toddler who can barely sit up is filmed breaking stones for the older children. ANOTHER VIDEO, aired repeatedly from 2000 through 2002, instructs very young children to attack soldiers with stones and tells them about their supposed strength and invincibility. "Don't be afraid," a 10-year-old sings to a five-year-old. "The stone in their hand turns into a rifle." Every adult knows that stones can't be a match for rifles. But the Palestinian leadership mesmerizes its children through music and dance, while inculcating the fanciful notion that "the stone in their hand turns into a rifle," and that they should therefore be out fighting IDF rifles with their stones. As they have done repeatedly in the past, the United Nations and world media have rushed to condemn Israel for the deaths of civilians during Operation Rainbow. But very few observers have looked beyond these lamentable deaths to ask the crucial questions: Why are PA leaders sending civilians, especially children, to the front lines and encouraging them to seek death? What kind of political leaders send their five-year-olds, their "women, children and elderly," to the front lines of a war zone? Yasser Arafat supplied the answer on Palestinian television several years back. Asked what message he would like to send to Palestinian children, Arafat answered: "This child, who is grasping the stone, facing the tank, is it not the greatest message to the world when that hero becomes a shahid? We are proud of them" (PATV January 15, 2002). The PA chairman's explanation that dead children are the greatest message to the world finally puts PA policy into perspective. Palestinian leaders know that civilian corpses make powerful images and increase global anti-Israel sentiments. Dead Palestinian children make the Palestinians look like victims and create a smoke screen for the PA's terrorism war against Israeli civilians. Photos of dead Palestinian children are manipulated to balance photos of dead Israeli civilians killed in pizza shops and on buses, murdered by Palestinian terrorists. Simply put, dead Palestinian children create the illusion of moral symmetry. The saddest part of this twisted value system is how well it is succeeding. Palestinian civilians continue to flock to the front lines. And, tragically, the media have fallen for the Arafat trap, enabling the PA to continue its terror war while the world laments the "cycle of violence." Arafat's propaganda campaign, built on the corpses of these civilian pawns, continues to fool even the best-intentioned observers who focus only on who inadvertently hit the wrong target, not on who deliberately put the target there in the first place. Marcus is founder and director of Palestinian Media Watch. Crook is PMW's North American representative.
National Post [Canada], April 08, 2004: Blaming
Israel for child bombers? In a bold attempt at damage control fit for the PR hall of fame, the Palestinian Authority (PA) has come up with an innovative -- albeit bizarre -- response to the tide of world disapproval of recent foiled Palestinian attempts to use youths as suicide bombers. It's all Israel's fault, of course - but with a twist. We know the usual pattern of assigning blame to Israel for Palestinian terror attacks. If only Israel would stop targeted killings of terrorist leaders and stop building the wall to keep out terrorists, then the Palestinians wouldn't be driven to blow themselves up, killing and maiming Israeli civilians in the process. Indeed, a good chunk of the world still buys this argument. But even the most loyal Palestinian sympathizers have had trouble with the Palestinians' recent exploitation of minors, such as planting remote-controlled explosives on an unwitting 11-year-old in Gaza, or duping a naive 16-year-old in Nablus into becoming a suicide terrorist for 100 shekels (about $22 U.S.) and a date with 72 virgins in Paradise. Both attempts were foiled by the Israeli army before the youths could kill or be killed. News surfaced last week Israel had arrested three more Nablus teens who had been recruited as suicide bombers by Islamic Jihad. The plot was discovered when the older brother of 15-year-old Tamer Khawireh was suspicious of the new cellphone, clothes and cigarettes the Grade 9 student was flaunting. So the new twist on the "Blame Israel" strategy had to become more inventive. Despite the fact that terrorist organizations have already claimed responsibility for these would-be attacks, the creative PA spin is that Israel -- not terrorist groups -- recruited the kids, planted the explosives and made sure the world media stayed overtime to capture the events for posterity. All in the name of discrediting the Palestinians. So how did an 11--year-old walk into Israel with a bomb in his bag? According to official PA sources, "...the intelligence services of the occupying authorities [Israel] were the authors, directors and the organizers of the script....As [the boy] was coming home from school he was stopped by soldiers, who placed part of a rifle in his bag together with hand grenades and gas bombs, and then made the boy stand by his open bag so the weapons would be seen .... " [Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, March 27, 2004] The PA story says that Israeli intelligence collaborators "played with" the mind of 16-year-old Hussam Abdo of Nablus so he would blow himself up. He was caught with an explosive belt March 24 and safely disarmed by Israeli soldiers. Not only did Israel arrange the would-be suicide mission, according to this revisionist history, but it cleverly manipulated world media to make sure the event received maximum publicity. According to the PA twist, the Israeli army had asked journalists to stay late at the Nablus checkpoint that day, in anticipation of the arrest. The army then "put pressure on the foreign journalists to focus on the incident." And the PA allegations go a step further. According to an account in the official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Israel goes out of its way to publicize the use of children as suicide bombers - not just to discredit the PA, but to encourage more Palestinian children to blow themselves up. "The occupation [Israel] in this situation and with this lie, is playing with its own blood, and it is like they are encouraging children to go from stone-throwing to use of explosives.... Israel's focusing accusations about children [in suicide terror] is in fact an open invitation to other children to imitate the accusations, because it is characteristic of children to blindly imitate." [Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, March 18, 2004]. In fact, it is the Palestinian Authority, not Israeli intelligence, that has preyed on the tendency of children to "blindly imitate" the actions of their peers and elders, with its systematic and relentless indoctrination of children to seek Shahada, martyrdom for Allah. Music videos directed at children call child martyrdom "sweet" and offer enticing images of child paradise. One, broadcast hundreds of times since Dec. 26, 2000, features child martyr Muhammad Al Dura in paradise flying a kite, frolicking on a beach and riding a Ferris wheel. "I am waving to you not in parting, but to say, 'Follow me,'" he tells other child martyrs-in-waiting. Palestinian textbooks contain poems glorifying child martyrs. Yasser Arafat has called dead Palestinian children "the greatest message to the world" [PA TV, Jan. 15, 2002]. Soccer tournaments and summer camps are named after teenage suicide bombers, thus encouraging children and youth to follow these role models. Asked on a June 2002 PA TV broadcast whether she prefers Shahada or peace and full rights for the Palestinian people, an articulate 11-year-old girl replies without hesitation, "Shahada." And according to Palestinian surveys, between 70 per cent and 80 per cent of Palestinian children share her aspiration. Taught to overcome their natural fear of death, they are the young suicide bombers of the future - and they won't all be lucky enough to be intercepted. Itamar Marcus is founder and director of Jerusalem-based Palestinian Media Watch (www.pmw.org.il). Barbara Crook, a writer and university lecturer in Ottawa, is PMW's North American representative.
Introduction Ottawa Citizen, March 28, 2004: "Dangerous
misconception" The Western
world sees Hamas as a terrorist organization seeking Israel's destruction,
but treats the Palestinian Authority (PA) as a peace partner, either
actual or potential, for Israel. The fact that Israel continues to
seek contact with PA leaders heightens the clear distinction made
between the PA and Hamas.
But the distance between Hamas and the PA has been shrinking for years. And the way the PA has responded to the killing of Yassin shows just how close the two groups actually are. The PA has gone far beyond its expected level of condemnation of the killing, and has eulogized Yassin as a leader representing all the Palestinian Authority. PA Prime Minister Ahmed Qurei, for example, told PA TV that just as "Yassin united the Palestinians in his life he united them again in his death." Yasser Arafat's official daily, Al Hayat Al Jadida, published a cartoon of a wheelchair shaped as a map of what the PA calls "Palestine" (which erases all of Israel) thereby stating graphically that Yassin and "Palestine" are one and the same. In an unprecedented move, PA television ceased all regular programming for days, and except for brief news reports broadcast only slides of the Koran sung to mournful tunes. In the Arab world, this Koran broadcasting is usually reserved for the deaths of heads of state, as was done on Syrian TV after the death of Hafez Assad. That PA TV treated Yassin in this fashion demonstrates his elevated stature among PA leadership and PA society. Anyone listening to PA leaders' pronouncements in Arabic over the years has recognized that there never was a meaningful ideological divide between the PA and Hamas. It is well understood, for example, that Hamas believes Islam demands Israel's destruction. As the Hamas charter states, "Palestine is an Islamic Wakf the liberation of Palestine is an individual duty binding on all Muslims everywhere." Less noted is that PA religious leaders have repeatedly made identical rulings. Even when the Oslo Accord appeared to be in its heyday, Yousuf Abu Sneinah, preacher of Al-Aksa Mosque, issued this ruling on PA TV: "The land of Palestine is a Wakf for all The liberation of Palestine is an obligation for the entire Islamic nation " (April 30, 1999). The perception is that a difference between Hamas and the PA is that the latter, at least in principle, had given up using violence to reach its political goals. Yet it was Arafat who said in 1999, literally anticipating the current terror war: "The agreements won't liberate the land. Every centimeter needs struggle, and the land needs blood" (Al Hayat Al Jadida, January 25, 1999). When Hamas started using suicide terrorists to kill Israelis in 1996, the PA condemned the killings in English. But in Arabic, PA leaders made it clear that there was no difference in attitude, only a division of labor. Muhammad Dahlan, then head of Preventive Security in Gaza, said that the presence of Hamas "is important and essential in the cooperation in the building." Hani Alhasan, a member of the Fatah Central Committee, explained the role of Hamas: "Unity is in the nature of construction, and it is incumbent upon us to divide the work among the builders." (Al Ayyam, August 31, 1997). As long ago as 1997, after the bombing at Tel Aviv's Apropos cafe, a member of the PA Legislative Council expressed his condolences to the family of the suicide bomber during a session of the Legislature, and "his words were interrupted by the applause of the members of the [PA Legislative] Council" (Al Hayat Al Jadida March 27, 1997). It should be stressed that all this cooperation was openly expressed in PA society long before the current terror war began in October 2000. After starting the terror war, the PA completely erased any differences between the "builders" by creating its own suicide terror unit, the "Aksa Martyrs Brigade," which has committed numerous suicide terror attacks identical to those of Hamas. IF THERE is any difference today between Hamas and the PA, it's in their attitudes toward temporary agreements with Israel. While the Hamas charter states, "There is no solution to the Palestinian problem except by jihad," the PA has argued that temporary agreements can be used to gain strategic territory from which to fight more easily for Israel's destruction. Then PA
minister Abdel Aziz Shahin explained this just months before the PA
started the terror war: "The Oslo agreements [were] a foothold
and not a permanent settlement, since war and struggle on the land
is more efficient than a struggle from a distant land... The Palestinian
people will continue the revolution until they achieve the goals of
the '65 revolution..." that is, the destruction of Israel
Faisal Husseini called the Oslo Accords a "Trojan Horse... the Oslo agreement, or any other agreement, is just a temporary procedure... according to the higher strategy [Palestine is] 'from the river to the sea.'" (Al-Arabi Egypt, June 24, 2001). Today, the Palestinian Authority and Hamas both embrace the use of terror to fight Israel. The only meaningful difference between them is the acceptance or rejection of political process as a vehicle to destroy Israel. Marcus is founder and director of Palestinian Media Watch. Crook is PMW's North American representative.
Jerusalem Post Op-Ed & the National Post (Canada), January 29, 2004: It's
Aspiration, not Desperation "I always wanted to be the first woman who sacrifices her life for Allah. My joy will be complete when my body parts fly in all directions." These are the words of female suicide terrorist Reem Reyashi, videotaped just before she killed four Israelis and herself two weeks ago in Gaza. What is surprising about this horrific statement is that she put a positive value on her dismemberment and death, distinct from her goal to kill others. She was driven by her aspiration to achieve what the Palestinians call "shahada," death for Allah. She had two distinct goals: To kill and to be killed. These independent objectives, both positive in her mind, were goals greater than her obligations and emotional ties to her two children. This aspiration to die, which contradicts the basic human instinct for survival, is at the core of the suicide terrorism fervor. Only when this death worship component is recognized as a basic tenet of Palestinian belief will it be possible to understand the challenges Israel and the world face from suicide terror. Palestinian society actively promotes the religious belief that their deity craves their deaths. Note the words of a popular music video directed at children, broadcast hundreds of times on PA TV, which depicts the earth thirsting for the blood of children: "How sweet is the fragrance of the shahids, how sweet is the scent of the earth, its thirst quenched by the gush of blood, flowing from the youthful body." This conviction that the deity thirsts for or craves human death as tribute and sacrifice has its roots in ancient beliefs. The Bible cites ancient cultures of the Land of Israel: "Their sons and their daughters they sacrifice to their Gods" [Deut: 12]. Even the Israelites were drawn to it: "And they built altars to give their sons and daughters to Molech which God did not command nor consider this abomination [Jeremiah: 32]." As recently as 500 years ago, South American tribes used to leave children to die on mountain tops as presents to their gods. The common denominator driving human sacrifice cults was the belief that the deity craved the death of innocents. This is precisely the belief that the leaders of Palestinian society are inculcating in their people. Moreover, Palestinians have been taught on PA TV by their religious leaders that they are born for the very purpose of dying for Allah: "The believer was created to know his Lord and to uphold Islam to be a shahid, or intend to be a shahid. If the Muslim does not aspire shahada, he will die as in the Jahiliya [pre-Islam faith]. If we truthfully request it of Allah, He will grant us its rewards even if we die in bed." This message is of paramount significance. The Muslim is born in order to die the right death, according to Palestinian Islam. Death need not be the termination of life to be prevented, but can be transformed into the ultimate achievement, on the condition it is for the deity. Those who do achieve this death are promised rewards by religious leaders on PA TV: "All his sins are forgiven from the first gush of blood; he is exempted from the torments of the grave (Judgment)... he marries 72 Dark-Eyed [Virgins or Maidens of Paradise]... on his head is placed a crown of honor, one stone of which is worth more than all there is in this world." EVEN CHILDREN
are not spared the indoctrination that the deity wants their deaths.
A telling example is the story of 14-year-old Faras Ouda, a boy elevated
to heroism by the Palestinian leadership. What was Faras Ouda's great accomplishment that Arafat elevated him to archetypical role model? The boy's goal in life was to die for the deity, as reported in the PA daily Al-Hayat Al Jadida: "On the day of his death Faras Ouda left his home with a slingshot, after having made himself a wreath decorated with photos of himself and having written on it 'The Brave Shahid Faras Ouda.' Faras Ouda wanted to die for the deity, achieved it, and thus became Arafat's hero. Palestinian mothers have been taught to aspire to death for Allah for their children. A mother explained recently on PA TV why she expressed joy upon hearing of her son's death: "A mother makes sounds of joy because she wants him to reach shahada. He became a shahid for Allah Almighty. I wanted the best for him; this is the best for [my son] Shaadi." PA ideology rejects the value of 'life' that other societies hold supreme. As expressed by a senior historian, professor Issam Sissalem, in a lecture on PA TV: "We are not afraid to die, and do not love life." Like their
adult role models, Palestinian children have learned to see dying
for the deity as their goal in life. In a chilling talk show interview
on PA TV, two 11-year-old girls explain cheerfully and eloquently
what they and their young friends desire: In the ancient world, there was widespread belief that the deity wanted humans to die as the ultimate form of worship. People gave their children to the deity of Molech and the Baal. This ancient belief has now returned to plague the world. The world
had assumed that the Palestinian suicide terrorist was facing a dilemma
of having to choose between the "value" of killing Jews
and the value of life. Clearly, this is false. Itamar
Marcus is director of Palestinian Media Watch.
Jerusalem Post Op-Ed, January 4, 2004:
The committee is Chaired by Sen. Arlen Specter. Sen Hillary Clinton, who is not a member of the committee, requested to participate after her meeting last week with Mr. Marcus, and seeing the documentation of the nature of PA indoctrination of their children. Her strong statement condemning PA education appears below. Due to the importance of the topic the entire hearing, including the video documentary, was broadcast on C-Span The following are the story in today's Jerusalem Post and the formal statement submitted by Mr. Marcus as a summary of his opening remarks. Jerusalem Post, Oct. 31, 2003. NEW YORK
The anti-Semitic indoctrination of children by the Palestinian Authority
must stop, Sen. Hillary Clinton of New York told her colleagues Thursday.
The following is the formal statement submitted by Mr. Marcus as a summary of his opening remarks:
The PA Ministries of Education and Sport have turned the most abhorrent murderers of Jews into role models and heroes for Palestinian youth. A soccer tournament for 11-year-old boys was named for Abd Al-Baset Odeh - the terrorist who murdered 30 in the Passover Seder suicide bombing. [Sports section, Al Hayat Al Jadida Jan 21, 2003]. This past summer, during the period of the US sponsored Road Map, numerous summer camps were named for suicide bombers, including a camp for teenagers named after a teenage suicide bomber, a 17 year old girl, Ayyat Al Akhras. Another camp for girls was named after Wafa Idris, the first woman suicide bomber. Many schools, cultural events, educational programs, and trophies, are named after terrorist murderers and suicide bombers. There can be no greater incitement to hatred and violence than the recurring portrayal of Palestinian terrorists as role models for children. As recently as September this year PA Chairman Arafat and 13 PA Leaders jointly sponsored a soccer tournament honoring arch terrorists. The PA leaders included Saeb Erikat; Jibril Rajoub; the Minister of Sport - Abdul Fatach Hamal; the Mufti of the PA Ikrama Sabri; and 10 other senior PA officials. Each of the 24 soccer teams was named for a terrorist or other Shahids ["Martyrs"] including some of the most infamous murderers like Yechya Ayash, the first Hamas bomb engineer, who initiated the suicide bombings, and Dalal Mughrabi, a terrorist woman who hijacked a bus killing 36 including American Gail Ruben in 1978; [Al Ayyam, Sept. 21, 2003] At the completion of this tournament Saeb Erikat distributed the trophies. While Music videos around the world are used to entertain children, in the PA they are used to indoctrinate children to hatred, violence, and Shahada. Regularly broadcast PA music videos have actors depicting Israelis carrying out execution-style murders of old men, woman and children, or blowing up mothers with their babies. In one music video broadcast continuously in 2003, actors portray a woman being murdered in cold blood in front of her daughter. In another, broadcast tens of times in 2003, the image of young girl on a swing turns into a flaming inferno, and a football blows up after being kicked by a child. Children are taught through these videos not only to hate and to be violent, but are openly encouraged to aspire to death through Shahada [Martyrdom]. Clips designed to offset a child's natural fear of death portraying child Shahada as both heroic and tranquil, have appeared on PA TV thousands of times over three years. [2000-2003] One clip for children ends with the words: "Ask for Death - the Life will be Given to you". In another, a child writes a farewell letter and goes off to die. Children who have achieved death through suicide missions have been turned into PA heroes and role models by the PA leaders. The hatred, anti Semitism and Shahada encouragement appear in the PA schoolbooks as well. The poem The Shahid [The Martyr] in a new PA schoolbook includes the phrase: "I see my death, but I hasten my steps toward it" [Our Beautiful Language, grade 7, p. 97] The PA argument that some of the books are copies of Jordanian books is not relevant, as a child being taught that Jews are evil is not going to be less influenced because of the identity of the publisher. Furthermore, even the new PA-produced schoolbooks teach hatred, de-legitimize Israel, and include anti-Semitic themes. This education will perpetuate the conflict into the next generation. It is important to note that the PA is making use of foreign funding to promote this hatred among its children. Summer camps named for suicide bombers this summer were funded by UNICEF. [Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, July 22, 2003, Al-Ayyam July 18, 2003, Al-Quds, July 23, 2003]. Renovation of a school named for Dalal Maghrabi, a terrorist who participated in the murder of 36 including an American, was funded by USAID [Al-Hayat Al-Jadida July 30 2002]. And whereas the PA announced two days later that they had changed the name, in order to receive the USAID funding, PA press reports indicated that the name was still being used. [Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, August 16, 2002] Clearly, children are being incited to hatred, violence and Shahada, not merely by fringe elements in the PA, but by the entire mainstream of PA leadership and society. This incitement to hatred and violence penetrates the minds of the PA children and, after terrorism itself, is the single greatest long-term obstacle to peace. Under the Oslo accords and subsequently under the Wye accords, the PA obligated itself to cease this incitement, but has ignored its own laws. In the interest of achieving a lasting peace, pressure must be brought on the PA, through all available means, including temporary political isolation and the temporary freezing of financial support, in order to impress upon the Palestinians the importance of peace education. The following concrete steps should be taken by the PA immediately: 1. Music videos promoting hatred, violence, and Shahada must never again be broadcast on PA TV. 2.The practice of naming schools, cultural events, educational programs, sport events and trophies after terrorists and suicide bombers must cease. Educational institutions and cultural frameworks currently named for terrorists must be changed. 3. PA children must be taught that Israel is a legitimate country with a right to exist. 4.There is no greater incitement against Israels legitimacy as a state, than to mark the word Palestineor occupied Palestinein place of Israel on all maps in the PA. These maps must be removed from Palestinian schools, schoolbooks and TV broadcasting and be replaced by maps that show Israel by name in Arabic. This will be the most important act of recognition of Israel by the PA, more important than the signing of the Oslo Accords. To continue the current practice, makes the statements of recognition of Israel at Oslo irrelevant and sends a clear message to the population that is was not said with integrity. 5.
The hatred and anti Semitism in the PA schoolbooks must be removed.
The PA argument that many of the books are copies of Jordanian books
is not relevant to the issues at hand, which is, the educational damage
being done to the children. A child being taught that Jews are evil
is not going to be less influenced because of the identity of the
publisher. In addition, even the new PA produced schoolbooks educate
to hatred, de-legitimize Israel, and include anti Semitic themes.
The PA schoolbooks must be reprinted without the hatred before the
start of the next school year.
Observing a society's heroes offers insight into its nature and values. It is therefore distressing to observe how the Palestinian Authority transforms those who kill Jews, including women terrorists, into its heroes and role models, especially for children. Immediately after the first suicide bombing by a woman, Wafa Idris, on January 27, 2002, the PA undertook a very public campaign of indoctrination of its women to see themselves as potential suicide bombers. Female suicide bomber Hanady Jaradat, who murdered 19 last week, is a product of this indoctrination. After the Idris bombing, the official PA structures immediately turned Idris into a heroine and her murder into an act to be emulated. Within days, the PA held a demonstration in her honor with young girls carrying posters with Idris's picture, and the words: "The Fatah Movement... eulogize with great pride the heroic Martyr Wafa Idris." [Al-Ayyam, February 1, 2002]. Articles by women appeared within days throughout the PA media: "Raviha Diyav, of the Palestinian Women Union emphasized that the participation of Idris in the attack shows the determination of the Palestinian women to participate as full partners in the national struggle, alongside her brothers." [Al-Ayyam, February 1, 2002] The PA, seeing that women could more easily get by Israeli security, immediately created a framework for women's terrorist activity: "The purpose of this brigade is to carry out attacks on the Israeli home front. The troop has been named the brigade in honor of the Martyr Wafa Idris." [Al-Quds, March 1, 2002] PA-controlled Palestinian Television immediately joined the promotion. It started broadcasting a musical video clip starring a woman singing to background scenes of extreme violence, who is suddenly transformed from a mere singer into a warrior wearing an army uniform singing of her desire to fall as a Martyr: "You will not be saved, Oh Zionist, from the volcano of my land's stones, I will even willingly fall as a Martyr." [PA TV, March 10, 2002] A concert honoring Idris has been broadcast repeatedly, as recently as July 24 this past summer, as a constant reminder - Wafa is the Palestinian heroine: "My sister Wafa... you chose Martyrdom, in death you have brought life to our will." All this promotion led to a string of mostly unsuccessful suicide bombings by women and eventually to the bombing in Jerusalem by Ayat al-Akhras, a 17-year-old girl, whose victims included a teenage girl. The PA Then turned these two successful killers into symbols for girls. PA summer camps for girls were named for Idris and Akhras, both last year and this year. This is particularity disturbing as it is natural for children to see another teenager being honored as a role model. Idris has
become so popular that even non-terror items appear now in her name:
"The Shabiba student movement, 'the Martyr Wafa Idris cell' in
the Al-Quds Open University, celebrated the completion of a course
in democracy and human rights." It is important to note that just as the PA condemned last week's suicide bombing by Hanady Jaradat, it condemned Idris's attack in English while turning her into a heroine in Arabic: "The Palestinian leadership, on Sunday strongly condemned the suicide attack which took place in west Jerusalem..." [WAFA, January 27, 2002] Sadly, this campaign to turn female suicide bombers into role models is succeeding. In an interview after the first two suicide bombings by women, young girls on TV debated not the willingness to commit such atrocities but only the age at which it should be done: [19-year-old] Sabrine: "It's true that we're sad about children who have died, but at the same time we must be happy because the Shahids go to paradise. Ayat al-Akhras was 17 when she blew herself up. A girl of 17 is fully aware." TV moderator: "Sabrine, are you for it or against it?" Sabrine: "Of course I support blowing up, it is our right. Maybe no one will sympathize with us when they hear that children blow themselves up, but that, that's called heroism." Moderator: "Sabrine, is it natural that Ayat al-Akhras explodes herself?" Sabrine: "Of course its natural..." [11-year-old] Walla: "What she said about Ayat al-Akhras - that it was her right - she's correct in supporting it... Ayat was a girl... 17 years old. She could learn more - finish her education. Then, when no more boys are left, and after she's finished her education, she can carry out operations." [PA TV] Based on past PA actions, and not its empty condemnations, terrorist and murderer Hanady Jaradat will join the ranks of Idris and Akhras, and become a part of the PA lexicon of killers to be honored, adored and emulated. She will become a new role model for young Walla and Sabrine. And we will soon be hearing about the Hanady Jaradat summer camp for girls, and the new Hanady Jaradat course in democracy and human rights.
The
following appeared last week in the Palestinian daily Al Hayat Al
Jadida: These words wouldn't be surprising if they were said by any teacher in a Palestinian Authority [PA] school. However the person being quoted was an Israeli Arab teacher. The children ripping up Israeli flags were Israeli Arabs kids. The teacher who will not consider using a map showing Israeli cities in his classroom is an Israeli Arab on salary from the Israeli Ministry of Education. With the media focus this week on the Or Committee's criticism of Israel's police during the Israeli Arab riots, it was virtually forgotten why the police were shooting. It was October 2000. The Palestinian Authority had started war against Israel. Two days into the war thousands of Israeli Arabs throughout the Galil joined the battle on the side of Israel's enemies, supported vocally by Arab leaders and passively it seemed by the general population. They threw stones, firebombs, burned tires, killed one Israeli Jew and injured many others, as they closed down the main roads of the North for days. Israel, it seemed, had lost the allegiance of 20% of its citizens, who in a time of war, had sided with the enemy. How did it happen? While there certainly are many contributing factors, there is ample evidence that this transfer of allegiance was one of the prominent goals of the Palestinian Authority long before the start of the October 2000 War. The PA implemented a systematic and determined policy towards Israel's Arabs, especially the youth, targeting them continuously with the message that their identity and allegiance should be with the PA alone. At the PA initiative, there was a never ending agenda of PA - Israeli Arab meetings, contacts, educational programs, sporting events, conventions and cultural events that were being reported daily in the PA press and the message both explicit and implicit was always one of joint history, culture, and destiny. When the
PA decided to have a "Miss Palestine" contest in 1999, they
included Israeli Arabs girls. Moreover, they made sure that 6 out
of the 10 finalist and the winner, were all Israeli Arabs. When they
set up a national soccer team, the Coach was an Israeli Arab from
Nazareth. There were numerous organizations and programs in the PA
whose sole purpose was to promote this involvement and identity, including
"Committee for Relations with 1948", "Children without
Borders", "Contacts between the members of a United People",
"Relations without Borders" - all of which had ongoing activities
whose purpose was, according to the PA daily: "to increase the
contact and affinity between the members of the Palestinian people
in the West Bank, the 'Inside' [Israel] and the 'Gaza Strip'. [Al
Quds, May 24, 1999]. In Arafat's office there was a special wing,
called 'the Committee for Contacts with the Residents of Occupied
Palestine'. Terms like 'Inside Arabs' and the 'Residents of Occupied
Palestine' are all PA euphemisms for Israeli Arabs. The PA denied
the possibility of the existence of an 'Israeli- Arab' writing in
one 1999 editorial - "there can not be an Israeli Arab. How can
the executioner and the victim be one?" The PA
was careful to send representatives to events that were internal to
Israeli Arabs. Numerous graduation ceremonies in Jerusalem and the
Galil had no representative of Israel's Ministry of Education but
did have a PA representative: The opening gestures by the PA were actively accepted by Israel's Arab leaders who joined in urging Israeli Arab youth to reject any Israeli identity they may have considered. MK Azami Bashara, for example when campaigning in Israel, marched with tens of Israeli Arab youth holding PA flags. He explained on television that were they to lose their Palestinian identity, all that would remain would be their family and tribal identity, but not an 'Israeli-Arab' identity, because 'there is no such identity.' Speaking to Arab youth he said "The blue card [Israeli ID card] you have in your pocket is not an identity card; it is a residence card." In the
election campaign of 1999, the Israeli Arab leadership fought for
the votes of Israeli Arabs by competing in their denial of an Israeli
identity. Rowya Habibi, the daughter of Emil Habibi who was so Israeli
he had been awarded the Israel Prize, said in a TV broadcast of the
Arab -BALAD political Party: And a similar
message in the Arab Hadash Party broadcast: The PA initiated the process of 'de-Israelizing' Israel's Arabs and found in them, willing partners. This happened openly, starting immediately after the establishment of the PA, under the eyes of the Israeli government who did nothing to try and preserve the allegiance of its citizens. Already in 1999 the PA had been so successful that Al Quds, a PA newspaper, summed up Israeli Arab attitudes in these words: "This state [Israel] is not their state, its interests are not their interests, its symbols are not their symbols, its policy is not their policy." [Al Quds, April 20, 1999] Tragically, even if this did not reflect all Israeli Arab attitudes then, it may well be the case in the not too distant future.
During
a Palestinian high school graduation ceremony last week the students
preformed a ten minute Dabka dance to the following repeating words: This joyous anticipation of Israel’s destruction through armed conflict at the graduation ceremony was played to hundreds of parents and students, and was broadcast on Palestinian TV. It should have brought outraged protest from Israel’s leaders and media, as continued education of Palestinian children to anticipate Israel’s destruction, is all that is necessary to assure that war continues into the next generation. However, it was not even an issue in the Israeli media. This is but one example of the great disparity between what is being reported in the Israeli press about today’s Palestinian world and what is really happening, as seen via the window of the Palestinian media. What is most striking is that the common denominator in all the Israeli media distortions, is the attempt to create a perception that the PA now is sincerely promoting peace with Israel. Last Friday’s Maariv ran a story entitled “Pizmon Chadash - a new refrain” describing great changes in claimed had transpired in the Palestinian media. It wrote as “proof” of the significant changes in PA TV: “The songs praising the Shahids have been silenced, and in there place is a new hit: ‘the song of peace and freedom’ that is played on PA TV nearly around the clock”. Maariv gives the impression that the PA has truly reformed and that an atmosphere of peace pervades PA TV. Unfortunately, this is nearly a total fabrication. The PA did produce a single video clip “song of peace and freedom” but it was broadcast exactly once. 7 minutes of peace promotion - not quite “around the clock”. And those few minutes are completely overwhelmed by the continued broadcast of hate material, albeit on a smaller scale. There is certainly no peace atmosphere on PA TV. The satisfaction expressed at the removal of Shahid glorification clips is likewise premature, and shows a lack of understanding of the Palestinian world. The PA is now running summer camps attended by thousands of children and a dominant theme, as reported in their media, is shahid and suicide bomber adoration. This is as direct continuation of the PA educational policy for many years, teaching children to admire terrorist who killed large numbers of Israelis, by naming schools, sporting events, educational programs and institutions, after those terrorists. In the past for example, Dalal Mughrabi - the terrorist who in 1978 participated in the murder of 36 Israelis and American nature photographer Gail Ruben, has a school near Hebron named for her [Al-Hayat Al-Jadida July 30 2002] a summer camp in 2001, [PATV August 9, 2001] a Kindergarten [Al Ayyam May 30, 2001] a woman’s youth course [Al-Hayat Al-Jadida January 25, 2002] and much more. Ayyat al-Akhras, the second woman suicide bomber of the Kiryat Hayovel supermarket in Jerusalem, had a summer camp named for her last year [Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Aug. 4, 2002] In January a soccer tournament under the auspices of the PA ministry of Education, was named for the suicide bomber who murdered 30 during the Passover Seder Massacre. This policy is continuing this summer. The PA daily reported this week on a summer camp named for Jihad Al-Amarin, the founder of the suicide terror division of the Fatah, the Al-Aksa Martyrs’ Brigade. And to guarantee the children understand the message, the camp activities included a visit to the terrorist’s home: “Yesterday the camp’s participants went to the home of the shahid Jihad Al-Amarin, where (they were greeted by) the shahid’s wife, children and family. During the visit there were speeches praising the virtues of the shahid Jihad Al-Amarin... The shahid’s wife expressed her joy at our people’s loyalty to her husband, stating that the shahid Jihad followed a national mission. During the visit the shahid’s wife was presented with the camp’s shield.” [Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, July 13, 2003] This was but one among tens of summer camps named for shahids. Even a
dose of incitement to murder was included just this week on PA TV.
Dr Hassan Khader, founder of the Al Quds Encyclopedia, during a hate
lecture focusing on what he describes as Israel’s war against
Palestinian trees, made a point of also quoting what has been a repeating
theme of PA religious teaching: So what then, has changed in the PA media? Over the last few weeks there has been a drop in the quantity of incitement to hatred and violence on Palestinian television, but not in the quality. The message has not changed, as indicated by the Debka dance, but it is being dispensed in smaller doses. The holes in broadcasting time, that used to be filled with hours of hate clips, are being replaced by an occasional nature program, many hours of talk shows which often include significant hate incitement, and by hours of cartoons. And a daily dose of hate clips is still included. Minutes a day, instead of hours. If the
goal is to look for technical improvements on the part of the PA in
order to give them a good grade, then one might focus on the fewer
hours of hate TV. However, if the goal is peace then the celebrations
of a change in PA TV are quite premature. The ideology must change.
Peace must be taught. Israel must be recognized, not just in Washington,
but in the PA high schools and graduation ceremonies, as well. Israel
must appear on PA maps. Murder and hate education but be totally eliminated.
If the goal is peace, then a few more hours of Mickey Mouse on TV,
just isn't going to be enough.
One of the most meaningful gauges of the integrity of a peace process and its likelihood for success is the degree to which the “peace partners” educate towards peace. It is for this reason that the entire Palestinian Authority (PA) education apparatus, both formal and informal, has been such a dismal disappointment. Instead of seizing the opportunity to educate the future generations to live with Israel in peace, the PA has done everything in its power to teach hatred to young minds. Making matters worse, the Palestinian Authority has been spreading two clever lies about the schoolbooks that have succeeded in deflecting international pressure for change. This week that at meeting in Jordan, Nebil Shaath answered Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom’s complaint about the schoolbooks saying that the PA has “spent five years” rewriting the books, implying there are now proper. Then he added, that Israel used the same old Jordanian books for educating the local Arab population “for 30 years”, and therefore has no valid complaint to the PA. Many European governments, and many Israelis, have come to the PA’s defense, citing these and other arguments. The truth about the PA schoolbooks, is first, that both new and old are far from proper - both include anti-Semitism, de-legitimize Israel’s existence and incite to hatred and violence. In the new 6th grade book “Reading the Koran”, anti-Semitism is presented openly, as children read about Allah’s warning to the Jews that because of their evil Allah will kill them: “...Oh you who are Jews ...long for death if you are truthful... for the death from which you flee, that will surely overtake you ...” In other sections they learn of Jews being expelled from their homes by Allah, and in another Jews are said to be like donkeys: “Those [Jews] who were charged with the Torah, but did not observe it, are like a donkey carrying books...” This religious based anti-Semitism is the most dangerous, as children are taught that hating Jews is God’s choice. And while Islam is not being critiqued, it is very grave that although Islam has positive traditions regarding Jews, the PA educators chose to incorporate only hateful religious traditions. The
new PA schoolbooks that Shaath was so positive about, also teach that
Israel has no right to exist, de-legitimizing Israel as a foreign
occupier, compared to colonial Britain: “Colonialism: Palestine
faced the British occupation after the First World War in 1917, and
the Israeli occupation in 1948 …” Since all of Israel
is said to be an “occupation” all of Israel’s cities,
regions and natural resources are presented as being part of “Palestine”.
For example: The Negev, Beersheba and the Sea of Galilee are in Israel and do not border the disputed territories of Judea and Samaria. Yet PA children are taught these are “Palestine”. Continuing this ideology a book is citing dedicated to “...Palestinians, so that they would remember their stolen homeland and work for its salvation...” and it is referring, not to the disputed territories, but Israel pre 1967. Educating not to recognize Israel’s existence is cemented through tens of maps in the schoolbooks in which “Palestine” encompass all of Israel. Israel does not exist on any map, within any borders. The PA defense of their schoolbook map, that since there are no final borders the map is not portraying modern “Palestine” but “Mandatory Palestine”, is an insult to our intelligence. Are we expected to believe that when Palestinian children see the map called “Palestine” in all their schoolbooks they imagine Britain a half a century ago? And when Beersheba is called Palestine, the children are picturing Biblical history? Another new book teaches what must be done for “occupied Palestine” and the “stolen homeland”: “Islam encourages this [love of homeland] and established the defense of it as an obligatory commandment for every Muslim if even a centimeter of his land is stolen. I, a Palestinian Muslim, love my country Palestine...” The
complete and total message Palestinian children are taught is that
Jews, according to Allah, are like donkeys; Israel is a colonial occupier
who stole their land; the cities, lakes and deserts of Israel are
“occupied Palestine”; and the, the children, have an obligation
to liberate it “even if a centimeter is stolen”. The second great PA lie expressed by Shaath this week, that Israel used these same old books, is particularly resourceful, as the best lies include a grain of truth. Indeed, Israel did use Jordanian books to educate the local Arab population. However, Israel reprinted the books without the hate education. In fact, Jordan registered a complaint to the UN charging that Israel’s changing the schoolbooks was a violation of international law, but the UN checked what Israel had done and approved it. The PA has put back into the old Jordanian education all the hate education that Israel had removed. Moreover, as early as three years ago foreign governments offered money to the PA to reprint these old books without the hateful material. The PA turned down the money and refused to reprint them using a variety of arguments, the first of which was: “Don’t get involved in our education - it is our Palestinian heritage.” These hateful Jordanian books are republished today unedited by the PA by choice and the PA must stop passing responsible to others for the hate content. Finally it should be stressed that all the books cited here were written during the most optimistic periods of the peace process, before the violence began in September 2000. They are not a reflection of the war, but were a great contributing factor to the war. The ongoing attempts to defend PA schoolbooks are tragic, as the PA is using these arguments to justify their indefensible hate education, and to refuse to improve their books. The PA is planting the seeds of the next war in their youth, and the defenders of PA hate education, including Israelis, are nurturing those seeds of war. Itamar
Marcus, director of Palestinian Media Watch, [www.pmw.org.il] was
Israel’s representative to the Tri Lateral [Israeli-Palestinian-
American] Anti- Incitement Committee. Palestinian
words since Aqaba - 'Planting
fear among the enemy is the exalted and holy meaning of terror."
This glorification of Palestinian terrorism by former minister Imad
Faluji appeared in Al-Hayat al-Jadida, the official Palestinian Authority
daily on June 9, just days after the Aqaba summit. Faluji went on
to explain that suicide bombings are justified. "We are not terrorists,
if the meaning is unjustified killing..." therefore, every murder
of Israelis is legitimate: "We do not regret what we have done
"
A
lecture to the American Bar Association, Introduction:
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