I’ve been watching the events unfold in Israel for the past few weeks and I am constantly amazed at how the truth gets twisted and turned around to fit a narrative that doesn’t exist.  The latest round of terror from the Palestinians seems to have started with claims by the Palestinian Authority that Israel was looking to change the status quo on the Temple Mount (known as Har HaBayit in Hebrew).  Their claims were that more Jews were visiting the Temple Mount and creating a situation whereby they would demand a place to pray – or at least a defacto situation whereby the Israeli government would insist on providing them a place to pray on the Mount – and therefore offending the Muslims and “threatening” the Al-Aqsa Mosque.  Of course, among the Palestinians the apparent logical progression of this is that the Al-Aqsa Mosque was in danger of being destroyed (I assume that’s what went through their minds) and this was fed by the Palestinian leadership – including Abu Mazen.

Never mind that Jewish visitation to the Temple Mount only amounted to about 0.3% (approximately 10,000 in total) of all visitors in 2014 (compare that to the 200,000 Christians and the 4,000,000 Muslims who visited there in 2014) (1) – to the Palestinian Authority and the Palestinian leadership – to them the Jews are threatening the Al-Aqsa Mosque.  Really?  The truth is the Palestinians – having decided and proclaimed that they are no longer bound by the Oslo Accords (their actions over the past 15 years seems to have indicated that they weren’t all that interested in being bound by those accords since 2000) needed some issue to claim that they must go on the offensive.  And now they have.  Over the past few weeks Palestinians – with the encouragement and provocation of the Palestinian Authority – have been waging a renewed and invigorated terror campaign against Israelis – mostly through stabbing attacks within the Green Line (the line demarcating the boundary between pre-1967 Israel and the West Bank).

The latest attacks involved two Palestinian terrorists – two cousins – one 13 years old and the other 15 years old – who stabbed two Israelis in the Pisgat Ze’ev neighborhood of Jerusalem (2).  The police responded and killed the older of the two attackers.  Rather than try to help defuse the situation the Palestinian Authority’s spokesman, Nabil Abu Rudeineh, declared that Israel “summarily executed” the 15 year old terrorist and demanded that the Israeli police arrest the personnel who fired on him.(3)  It comes as no surprise that the Palestinian Authority would make such a ludicrous claim.  They are looking to continue escalating the tensions and the violence all the while claiming that they are trying to calm the situation.  According to Israeli defense sources Abu Mazen (aka Mahmoud Abbas) is appealing for calm among the Palestinians (4).  However, while he may be appealing for calm he is also working to incite further attacks by claiming that every “drop of blood that was spilled in Jerusalem is pure blood as long as it’s for the sake of Allah. Every shahid (martyr) will be in heaven and every wounded person will be rewarded, by Allah’s will” (4) and that “Al-Aksa is ours and so is the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. They [the Jews] have no right to desecrate them with their filthy feet” (4).  As always, he speaks out of both sides of his mouth. Abu Mazen is the modern day Janus.  You cannot have it both ways – you cannot claim that you are trying to calm the situation and yet still exhort your followers to continue to attack and commit terrorist acts.

  1. “Only 0.3% of Yearly Visitors to Temple Mount are Jews”, The Jewish Press, Tzvi Ben-Gedalyahu, October 9th 2015, found at http://www.jewishpress.com/news/breaking-news/only-0-3-of-yearly-visitors-to-temple-mount-are-jews/2015/10/09/
  2. “Jerusalem stabbers were cousins, 13 and 15 years old”, The Time of Israel, Tamar Pileggi and Judah Ari Gross, found at http://www.timesofisrael.com/jerusalem-stabbers-were-13-15-year-old-brothers/
  3. “Abbas spokesman: Israel ‘executed’ teen stabber’, The Times of Israel, Adiv Sterman, found at http://www.timesofisrael.com/abbas-spokesman-israel-executed-teen-stabber/
  4. “Abbas working to restore calm in West Bank, Israeli sources say”, The Jerusalem Post, Jeruslaem Post Saff, found at http://www.jpost.com/Arab-Israeli-Conflict/Abbas-working-to-restore-calm-in-West-Bank-Israeli-defense-sources-say-421445