Though he reiterated his promise at the Sharm el-Sheikh ceremony, Abu Mazen's commitment to halt incitement to violence and hatred on official PA TV was already violated this past Friday. In late January, PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas (Abu Mazen) toured PA Television studios, instructing the director to tone down incitement as well as programs heaping praise upon him. Just this past Friday, a sermon was aired on PA TV outlining the planned destruction of the Jewish State. Palestinian Media Watch (PMW) has translated the sermon into English and publicized it.
PMW Director Itamar Marcus explained: "The Palestinian Authority, in its Arabic messages to its people, has always denied Israel's right to exist and has often presented the peace process as a tactic leading to Israel's destruction. This goal was repeated Friday, on the Palestinian Authority television, in the official sermon."
The sermon was delivered by senior Islamic Imam Ibrahim Mudyris. The Imam explained that the limitation of the diplomatic process is that it can only conquer up to Israel's 1967 borders. He said that at a later stage the PA will achieve its goal of bringing about the complete destruction of Israel - the "return to the 1948 borders" and the towns of "Haifa, Jaffa, Lod, Ramla, Natanyah [Al-Zuhour] and Tel Aviv [Tel Al-Rabia]."
The following is the text of the Friday sermon, broadcast on official PA television on February 4, 2005:
Imam Ibrahim Mudyris: "We do not love any land more than the land of Palestine. Had the Jews not expelled us from it with their planes, their tanks, their weapons, their treachery around us, we would never leave you, O Palestine. (Quotes Muhammad, who promised he would return to Mecca as a conqueror).
"We tell you Palestine, we shall return to you, by Allah's will. We shall return to every village, every town, and every grain of earth which was quenched by the blood of our grandparents and the sweat of our fathers and mothers. We shall return, we shall return. Our willingness to return to the 1967 borders does not mean that we have given up on the land of Palestine. No!
"We ask you: Do we have the right to the 1967 borders? We have the right. Therefore, we shall realize this right with any mean it takes. We might be able to use diplomacy in order to return to the 1967 borders, but we shall not be able to use diplomacy in order to return to the 1948 borders.
"No one on this earth recognizes [our right to] the 1948 borders [before Israel's existence]. Therefore, we shall return to the 1967 borders, but it does not mean that we have given up on Jerusalem and Haifa, Jaffa, Lod, Ramla, Natanyah [Al-Zuhour] and Tel Aviv [Tel Al-Rabia]. Never.
"We shall return to every village we had been expelled from, by Allah's will. Why? All the international laws deny the Palestinians their real borders. We might agree, but in the name of Allah, our grandfathers' blood demands that we return to them [the borders]. Your fathers' blood was shed there, at the villages, at Ashqelon, at Ashdod, at Hirbia [a village between Gaza and Ashqelon, where Kibbutz Zikim is located today] and at others places, hundreds of villages and towns. [Their blood] demands it from us, and it shall curse anyone who will concede a grain of earth of those villages.
"Our approval to return to the 1967 borders is not a concession for our other rights. No!... this generation might not achieve this stage, but generations will come, and the land of Palestine... will demand that the Palestinians will return the way Muhammad returned there - as a conqueror." |