The Palestinian Authority, after three days of silence on their terrorists’ murders of two IDF soldiers, took one more step Monday to self-destruct the Big Lie by blaming Israel. The Jewish Press discussed the Big Lie here on the eve of Yom Kippur.
Sure enough, one week later, the Palestinian Authority has come through in spades.
The first Palestinian Authority reaction to the fatal terrorist attack on a soldier in Hevron was from Fatah Central Committee member leader Abbas Zakie, who said that the Sgt. Gal Kobi was “not on a hike in Hevron,” implying that he was therefore “fair game.” Zakie blamed the “extremist Netanyahu government for being responsible for the soldier’s death.”
Zakie’s comments help blow up the Big Lie that foreign media have encouraged and inflated for decades. As The Jewish Press wrote here, “The Big lie has been crumbling, and the media, slowly but surely, have no choice other than giving up the anti-Zionist fight.”
State Dept. spokesmen can wring their hands as much as they want, but only the most avid Israel hater can get away with saying, “It’s all because of the ‘Occupation.’”
While Abbas did not condemn the murder of Sgt. Kobi nor the murder on Friday of Sgt. Tomer Hazan, Hamas took up the slack and congratulated the terrorists.
Meanwhile, Palestinian Authority foreign minister Riad al-Malki, without a hint of sorrow for the deaths of Sgts. Kobi and Hazan, advised Israel not to use the murders as a reason to evade peace talks.
He made his comments to the Bethlehem-based Ma’an News Agency. Al Malki is in New York, where the Palestinian Authority delegation is more concerned with boosting his support in the pro-Arab United Nations than in the peace talks charades.
Ma’an noted that PA chairman Mahmoud Abbas is avoided speaking about the “peace process.” The news agency reported that Abbas “seemed more inclined to remain quiet until the end of the year ‘to see what Israel will do and what will not do, and based on that we will be able to take a better decision.’”
The terrorists murders of two Israeli soldiers in three days also might have broken the back of Obama’s forced resumption of direct talks between the Palestinian Authority and Israel.
Jewish Home party leader Naftali Bennett said at the funeral for Sgt. Kobi Monday, “We will fight to get rid of the impression that killers can suddenly be released one day. Gal’s killers will be punished severely and I promise that we will act so that they will never be released.
Bennett and six other Cabinet ministers, including one from Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s Likud party, fired off a letter to the boss to demand a new discussion on the agreement to free 104 terrorists in return for the resumption of talks.
The terrorists are to be released in batches, depending on the Palestinian Authority’s good behavior, which has been short-lived.
“In recent days, we have witnessed two difficult murders that took the lives of two soldiers – Tomer Hazan and Gal Kobi. As a result, we demand an immediate government meeting on the policies regarding the release of terrorists,” the letter said.
It was signed by Likud minister Yisrael Katz, Jewish Home Ministers Uri Orbach, Uri Ariel and Bennett, and ministers of the Yisrael Beitenu faction of the Likud – Yair Shamir, Uzi Landau and Sofa Landver.
Meanwhile, Arabs petitioned the High Court Monday night to forbid the entry of Jews into the “Beit Machpelah” in Hevron, claiming that its ownership has not been proven.
A military court previously had declared that Jews legally bought the property, but the Defense Minister, formerly Ehud Barak and now Moshe Ya’alon, refused to give the final okay.
Following the murder of Kobi, Ya’alon signed on the dotted line, a strange Israeli policy that blocks Jews from developing Judea and Samaria until there is a terrorist attack.
“Those who try to uproot us from Hevron, the city of our forefathers, will only achieve the opposite,” Netanyahu stated. “We will continue to fight terrorism with one hand, and strengthen settlement with the other.”