When, in 1998, a Palestinian was fatally stabbed in Jerusalem—apparently by an Israeli terrorist—the country’s president visited the victim’s widow and the Defense Ministry gave his family a six-figure compensatory payment, akin to the support given to Israeli victims of Palestinian terror. Last Friday, the victim’s grandson murdered seven people leaving a Jerusalem synagogue. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, according to his spokesman Ned Price, hoped during his trip to Israel and Egypt this week that he could “put an end to the cycle of violence.” Stephen Daisley observes:
On Friday night, in Jenin, Ramallah, Nablus, and east Jerusalem, Palestinians gathered to celebrate the synagogue murders. Crowds set off fireworks, started bonfires, fired their weapons into the air, honked car horns, and chanted. In Hebron they handed out sweets to children while in Gaza cries of “Allahu akbar” boomed from mosque loudspeakers. . . . Hand out enough candies and pastries every time an Israeli is murdered and you will teach your children that killing is sweet. The lesson will not go unlearned.
Hello “cycle of violence,” my old friend; I’ve come to talk with you again. Except, it’s not true. It’s not a cycle of violence. It’s a choice of violence, a choice Palestinians keep making.
When Jerusalem assures foreign audiences there is “no partner for peace,” it is a well-worn talking point but it is not easily rebutted. Mahmoud Abbas, president of the Palestinian Authority, will not visit any grieving widows after Friday night’s attack. The Palestinians will pay no compensation to bereaved Israelis—they couldn’t afford to. The Palestinian Authority operates a Martyrs’ Fund that pays stipends to the families of Palestinians captured or killed while carrying out terrorist attacks against Israelis. In 2020, the fund disbursed 597 million shekels (£139 million) in such payments. Sweets for the children, shekels for their widowed mothers.
Where does this get the Palestinians? Nowhere near a state, nowhere even close to the conditions necessary to achieving one.
Read more on Spectator: https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/israel-is-trapped-in-a-cycle-of-national-self-sabotage/