by MELANIE PHILLIPS
For western liberals, the establishment of a Palestinian state alongside Israel is the only answer to the Palestinian-Israel conflict.
The Biden administration wants post-war Gaza to be ruled by the Palestinian Authority (PA). This is being resisted by Israel, one of its disagreements with the US over the conduct of the war for which the Biden administration is increasingly punishing it.
The US is impervious to the argument that the PA, no less than Hamas, would turn Gaza once again into a terror state. The Bidenites close their eyes to the copious evidence of PA incitement and rejectionism. They dismiss the huge salaries the PA pays to terrorists incarcerated in Israeli prisons and to the families of terrorists who have been killed.
They ignore the survey published 100 days after the outbreak of the Gaza war which revealed that around 82 per cent of Palestinian Arabs in Judea and Samaria support the October 7 pogrom, and that support for Hamas among the Arabs in Judea and Samaria rose from 12 per cent in September 2023 to 44 per cent in November-December 2023.
Now a startling and important report by the Israeli group Regavim, which works to protect Israel’s land and resources in order to uphold its integrity as a Jewish state, illustrates the insanity of assuming that the PA is a route to peace and security in the region.
Under the 1995 Oslo Agreement, a broad Palestinian security apparatus was established consisting of the Palestinian Police and other security officials who are supposed to combat terrorism and collaborate with Israel on security matters. But the Regavim report, “Officers by Day, Terrorists by Night”, has identified at least 78 members of the Palestinian Authority Security Forces (PASF), many of them officers, who since 2020 have carried out terrorist attacks against Jews.
Since Regavim gathered its information from official PA statements and announcements, this figure is likely to be a significant underestimate.
In an interview following the October 7 massacre, Palestinian Security Services spokesman Talal Duweikat said:
In 30 years, the Palestinian Security Services have sacrificed more than 2,000 martyrs and hundreds have been arrested, some serving life sentences.
Jibril Rajoub, the former head of the Preventative Security Service in Judea and Samaria, said that 12 per cent of Palestinian prisoners held in Israeli jails were members of the Palestinian security services. Hasin Hama’il, a spokesman for the leading party in the PA, Fatah, spokesman boasted about the high number of PASF officers in Israeli prisons and stressed that “the PASF do not arrest Munadhilin (Palestinian terrorists); to the contrary, members of the PASF are the very ones involved in the fight against the occupation”.
The Regavim report says that many PASF officers hold parallel positions in civil or military “resistance” movements such as the Al Aksa Martyrs Brigades (the military arm of Fatah). Rather than upholding public order and preventing terrorism, they themselves carry out acts of terrorism against Israeli civilians and members of Israel’s security forces.
PA national security forces carry body of 14 year-old terrorist Adel Daoud at his military-style funeral, 2022
It says that more and more PASF members and officers are taking a significant role in encouraging and supporting terrorism. Children and other family members of PASF staff and officers are actively involved in terrorist activities, alongside PASF officers who personally carry out murderous attacks against Israel.
PASF officers also disrupt Israeli security forces’ operations in Judea and Samaria. After the outbreak of the current war, Fatah commanders serving in the PA security apparatus in Jenin issued a 24-hour ultimatum to Abu Mazen (Mahmoud Abbas), demanding that he declare a total and open confrontation against Israel “by any and all means” or else they would declare a military revolt.
The reports lists examples of Fatah “martyrdom” proclamations identifying terrorists from the ranks of the PASF. It lists PASF officers arrested for involvement in terrorism between 2004 and 2020; those arrested prior to 2020; those wounded while carrying out attacks against civilians or IDF soldiers; those PASF personnel who incite terrorism. The details are specific and copious.
Since the October 7 pogrom, there have been many suggestions that the catastrophic failure of Israeli intelligence to understand the signals that such an onslaught was in the making was due to “the conception”, group-think based on wishful thinking that persistently misinterpreted and fatally underestimated the intentions and capacity of the Hamas leadership. The report observes that this catastrophic “conception” is still alive and well in Israel’s security and political circles over the PA’s activities in the disputed areas of Judea and Samaria.
Around the time that the survey of Palestinian support for Hamas in the disputed territories was published, Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Galant stressed “the importance of security coordination with the Palestinian Authority”. He declared:
At this time the Palestinian Authority is working to curb terrorism, to rescue Israelis who accidentally stray into territories under the PA’s jurisdiction, and I think that this effort is helping us — otherwise we will have to do it ourselves. If we reach a situation where they act against us — we will know what to do, but we’re not in that situation.
The report says, to the contrary:
It is not only Regavim’s contention that a reality in which the PASF turns its guns on Israel is not a futuristic scenario but is happening, increasingly, even now; senior officials in the Fatah Movement and the PASF have already made it very clear that the members of all branches of the PA security framework are actively involved in the struggle against “the occupation,” and proudly boast about the large and growing number of “martyrs” and prisoners from among their ranks.
The notion that on “the day after the war” the very same Palestinian “security mechanisms,” which are actually terrorist mechanisms, will bear responsibility for Judea and Samaria, as well as for Gaza is chilling; the very thought should be keeping every sane person awake at night. It is this same line of thought that brought the massacre of October 7th upon us.
The Palestinian Authority and its “security” mechanisms in particular believe themselves to be the hands entrusted with the dual mission of conquering Israel and eradicating the Jewish People. This is their operative plan and their ultimate objective. Any statement to the contrary, made in service of or by any other interest, is tantamount to burying one's head in the sand and poses a strategic threat to the State of Israel and the Jewish People.
The Biden administration and other western governments — as well as the Israeli establishment — have their heads very firmly stuck in this particular sand. That’s because it has suited everyone to pretend that there are “good” Palestinians who believe that fighting terrorism alongside Israel is in everyone’s interests. Just as wishful thinking about Hamas paved the way for the atrocities of October 7, this fantasy “conception” about the PASF has already been responsible for numerous terrorist attacks on Israelis. If the Biden administration has its way, it will pave the way for future pogroms.
The report by Regavim should be brought to the attention of the American public and their lawmakers, to alert them all to this further betrayal of Israel’s security that is being proposed in their name.
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