EDITOR'S NOTEBOOK
A Song Of Hate
D
on't be duped. There are fewer suicide bombers
now than there have been during 33 months of
Palestinian terror. And President George W. Bush
seems to believe Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian
Authority's new prime minister, is sincere in trying to break the
hold of terrorists despite his and-Jewish past.
But hard-core Palestinians loyal to Yasser Arafat, their presi-
dent and a proven master of murder, still want to claim the
Jewish state as theirs.
Palestinian children still learn that Jews are nothing more
than evildoers blocking reclamation. This indoctrination to
seek Death for Allah — Shahada — perme-
ates conversation, textbooks and music videos.
"The message has not yet changed," says
Itamar Marcus, the no-nonsense director of
the Jerusalem-based Palestinian Media Watch,
"and this is what I think is most significant.
Until we get a change in the message, until
they teach that Israel is acceptable, then we are
not going anywhere."
ROBERT A.
One of Israel's most astute and admired
SKLAR
monitors of Palestinian culture and politics,
Editor
Marcus warns us to watch the transparent,
corrupt P.A. leadership, which to the public
means Abbas, but in reality means Arafat, a sworn Jew hater.
We'd better take heed.
Last week, the same day the Israel news media and world
leaders sung the praises of Palestinians for removing graffiti
from some walls within the disputed territories, the P.A. held
school graduation and broadcast it on Palestinian TV.
"The high school students were singing and dancing,"
Marcus says in a provocative interview broadcast on
Israel TV on July 10, the day the P.A. ordered the
Palestinian news media to stop incitement.
The song they were dancing to? As Marcus relates,
these were the words to the song playing in the back-
ground as parents, educators and a TV audience looked
on:
Either because he doesn't want to or can't, Arafat has shown
no propensity for snuffing out the terror that has claimed at
least 820 Israelis and foreigners since September 2000.
Abbas' call for a truce three weeks ago was met with more
terrorist attacks and loss of life.
Can incitement be stopped? Yes, says Marcus, but it'll require
a dramatic shift in how Palestinians police themselves. For
starters, they will have to enforce anti-incitement laws already
passed. He says jail should be the penalty for anyone who
teaches Palestinian children that Israeli towns can be theirs
through the barrel of a submachine gun.
He reinforces why it likely will be generations for lasting
peace to evolve in the embattled region: 'As long as the P.A.
Ministry of Education encourages children to continue seeing
the future with Haifa and Acco as Palestinian, through the
sword, then lowering the number of minutes of this material
on television is not going to make a difference."
Desire Is Key
In short, until Palestinian schools literally rewrite their approach
to teaching, the hate will continue.
Abbas and other moderates may talk peace when the TV
cameras are rolling, but those sound bites mean nothing when
the core of any future sovereign Arab state known as Palestine
— its kids — are brainwashed into hating Jews so much they
would strap on suicide bomber belts to kill them.
Marcus is saying that moderates not only must talk peace,
but also must embrace planks of power within the creaky
Palestinian government before brainwashing endorsed by the
Ministry of Education stops.
And he's right.
Within the Palestinian Authority, schoolbooks could
be rewritten, Israel could be put on school maps, chil-
dren could be taught tolerance and the news media
could be monitored.
But this won't happen any time soon. Hate-mon-
gers tightly control Palestinian society and how news
reports are packaged.
"Right now," Marcus says, "there is active teaching
With words and with a rifle we will sing.
of
non-recognition — an active teaching of hatred.
Marcus
From Jerusalem to Gaza, Ramallah, Al Bira, Haifa,
That could be stopped. If there were a desire, it could
Jaffa and Ramla, there is no alternative even if they prom-
be stopped immediately."
ise us the Garden of Eden.
A U.S. rogue-regime expert, Raymond Tanter, con-
The sound of the submachine gun is heard
firms that a message of hate percolates beyond the
We will live and die only that our homeland should
Palestinian schoolhouses.
return to us. I am a Palestinian. My weapon is the stone
"Palestinian media urge children through TV adver-
and the knife.
tisements to drop their toys and pick up arms," says
Tanter, a political science professor emeritus at the
Does that sound like a commencement ceremony
University of Michigan in Ann Arbor and an adjunct
Jews should applaud? It's foolish to think, even for a
Tanter
scholar of the Washington Institute.
moment, that the mood on the street among
"At Palestinian summer camps," he adds, "tennis, bik-
Palestinians has changed. Sure, some Palestinians see
ing and swimming give way to holy war, martyrdom
through the blood-soaked cloaks of hate worn by Arafat and his
and firearms."
henchmen. But they have no ability to rise up against those in
Clearly, reform in how kids are taught and how news is spun
power.
is essential. Without it, recent calls by the P.A. for the incite-
ment and terror to end ring hollow For the moment, the deck
Strong Credentials
is stacked against fundamental change. Palestinian moderates
As research director for the Center for Monitoring the Impact
are too weak to overtake hard-liners.
of Peace from 1998-2000, Marcus wrote studies on Palestinian,
I urge every American to hear Marcus when he says: "Our
Jordanian and Syrian school textbooks. He was an Israeli dele-
goal here is not to look for technical improvements of the
gate to the Tri-Lateral Committee to Monitor Incitement, a
Palestinians to give them a good grade. Our goal is peace, and
byproduct of the 1998 Wye River Accords. That committee
unless we insist and demand peace education, the [U.S.-
represented American, Israeli and Palestinian interests. So
backed] road map, or any future peace agreement, won't bring
Marcus speaks with authority.
peace."
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