The Real Abu Mazen

The Real Abu Mazen
April 30, 2003

Everyone seems to be standing in line to shake his hand, to give him a hug, wish him luck, and help him on his way to eternal fame and glory. George Bush will invite him to the White House. Tony Blair at 10 Downing Street. And even our Israeli Prime Minister, Ariel Sharon, in Jerusalem. He is considered to be a moderate, something of a statesman, the ideal peace-partner. 

A dream come true; or is it. There are a few problems in the way of this perfect man. Mahmoud Abbas, otherwise known as Abu Mazen, was a founder of Arafat’s Fatah, the backbone of the murderous PLO terror organization. One might expect that over the years, perhaps his ideas and views have mellowed. However, that does not seem to be the case.

For example, several quotes taken from interviews with Abu Mazen, translated and posted by ‘The Middle East Media Research Institute’ (MEMRI):

1. ‘The Right of Return means a return to Israel and not to the Palestinian state... because it is from there that [the Palestinians] were driven out and it is there that their property is found.’;

2. ‘We were not prepared to limit the number of refugees who would be allowed to return, even if they had proposed a number of three million refugees.’;

3. ‘The lands occupied [by Israel] in 1967 must be returned. All the Arab countries that fought Israel have regained their lands and therefore, it is our right to get our lands back as well. We consider Jerusalem an occupied territory.’; and

4. ‘I challenge the assertion [that there has ever been a Jewish Temple.]’;

Some other examples of Abu Mazen’s reasonableness:

1. Abu Mazen is a full believer in the ‘phased victory’ plan, espoused by the PLO. Journalist Roni Shaked writes, ‘Abu Mazen believes that the formation of the Palestinian State will lead to the dissolving of the State of Israel into the Palestinian State’ Abu Mazen opposes violence, not on moral grounds, rather because it is ineffective.’ (Yediot Achronot 24.4.03);

2. The Israeli daily Ma’ariv quotes Abu Mazen speaking before Fatah leadership, on April 20, 2003: ‘Israel’s weak link is the way in which the government deals with policy. It is enough to implement several public measures on the Palestinian side, and several conciliatory statements, in order to achieve a victory.’;

3. On April 1, Abbas held a three-hour meeting with Hamas terror leader Abdel Aziz Rantisi. The New York Times reported that Rantisi called the meeting ‘positive’ and said Abbas ‘made no demands’ on Hamas -- even though Rantisi, in the meeting, ‘emphasized the importance of continuing what he called ‘the resistance’ in Israel and the occupied territories.’ According to media reports, Abbas offered to give Hamas the Education Ministry in his cabinet -- meaning that Hamas would control what is taught to all Palestinian Arab children;

4. When asked by the Arab newspaper a-Sharq al-Awsat on March 3, 2003 about talks between the PA and Hamas, Abbas said: ‘We didn't talk about a break in the armed struggle... It is our right to resist. The Intifadamust continue and it is the right of the Palestinian People to resist and use all possible means in order to defend its presence and existence.’ The interviewer then asked, ‘Including using arms’’ Abbas replied: ‘All means and arms as long as they are coming to your home, as this is the right to resist. The restriction applies only toShahada-Seeking [suicide] operations and going out to attack in Tel Aviv or Jerusalem.’

Only four days later, on a Friday night, terrorists murdered Rabbi Eli and Dina Horowitz in Kiryat Arba. Recently Mrs. Bernice Wolf, Dina Horowitz’ mother filed a complaint with the Israeli police against Abu Mazen, charging him with incitement to murder (Israeli Minister Ehud Olmert, former Mayor of Jerusalem, told the Wall Street Journal on June 3, 2002, ‘Israel cannot do business with terrorists.’); and

5. Abu Mazen is corrupt. According to Ronen Bergman, in his book The Authority Gives (HaReshut HaNotenet), ten million dollars were deposited in City Bank in Zurich by Abu Mazen’s brother;

Perhaps the most stinging indictment against this terrorist politician is his doctoral dissertation, The Other Side: The Secret Relationship between Nazism and the Zionist Movement. According to MEMRI, ‘In the introduction to his 1984 study, Abu Mazen referred to well-known Holocaust deniers, raised doubts that gas chambers were used for extermination of Jews, and claimed that the number of Jews murdered in the Holocaust might be ‘even less than a million.’ Abu Mazen claimed that the Zionist movement had a stake in convincing world public opinion that the number of victims was high; thus, it would achieve ‘greater gains’ after the war when the time came to ‘distribute the spoils.’

Abu Mazen wrote, ‘Many scholars have debated the question of the 6 million figure, and reached perplexing conclusions, according to which the Jewish victims total hundreds of thousands.’ The central claim Abu Mazen sought to prove is that the Zionist movement, with all its factions, conspired against the Jewish people and collaborated with the Nazis to annihilate it, because the movement considered ‘Palestine’ the only appropriate destination for Jewish emigration.

One of Abu Mazen’s closest aides is Muhammad Dahlan, appointed minister for internal security in his government. Abu Mazen and Muhammad Dahlan have been known to be very close, for quite a long time. Who is Dahlan? Just a few examples:

1. Dahlan is known to have ordered the bomb attack on the children’s school bus in Kfar Darom, an explosion that cost two Israeli lives and the legs of the three Cohen children. The CIA has secret recordings of Dahlan personally ordering the bomb attack;

2. He personally ordered production of tens of thousands of mortars, used to attack communities in Gaza; mortars which have also hit Sderot and other Israeli communities outside of Gaza; and

3. Together with Jibril Rajoub in Hebron, Dahlan orchestrated the beginning of the current Olso War, commanding Arafat’s forces in Gaza;

This is one of Prime Minister Abu Mazen’s closest associates, so important that he was willing forfeit his position should the Dahlan appointment not be approved by Arafat.

George Bush, Tony Blair and Ariel Sharon are about to join hands with a terrorist who believes that Jerusalem belongs to the Arabs, that a Temple never existed, that millions of so-called refugees should be allowed ‘back’ into ‘Israel proper’, and that during World War II, only a ‘few hundred thousand Jews were killed.’

We just marked Holocaust Memorial Day, in memory of the millions of dead. What would be more appropriate at this time than a full condemnation of Mahmoud Abbas and his denial of the Holocaust? I call on the voices of conscience of the Jewish people to cry out, denouncing the denial of our people’s heritage, decrying the refutation of the mass slaughter that decimated between six to seven million Jews, some sixty years ago.

Perhaps the cultured world isn’t interested in hearing a voice from Hebron, but the voices of others would be hard to ignore.

Negotiating with Nazis?

Negotiating with Nazis?
April 28, 2003

Shalom.

Being that tonight marks the beginning of the Memorial Day for victims of the Holocaust and victims of terror, I believe it is appropriate to broach the following subject.

Last week I spoke at length about the soon-to-be Prime Minister of the Palestinian Terrorist Authority, Abu Mazen. Abu Mazen’s doctoral thesis accused the Zionist movement, of conspiring against the Jewish people and collaborated with the Nazis to annihilate it, because the movement considered "Palestine" the only appropriate destination for Jewish emigration.

Of course, nothing could be further from the truth. The aim of the Zionist movement was to encourage Aliyah from Europe, not to decimate it.

But, what if it were true? Can you imagine the impact such a revelation would have on the Jewish people, on the leadership of the then future State of Israel? It is so preposterous an idea that, the implications so inherently evil, Jews making a deal with the devil himself, Hitler, Yemach shmo – one of the greatest fiends of all human history, it is unfathomable.

Yet, in a bizarre way, it looks like that is exactly what Israel is doing today, fifty five years after the creation of the state, fifty eight years after conclusion of the second world war and cessation of the Holocaust.

There are those in our midst who are actually willing to make a deal, participate in signing a ‘treaty’ with the greatest and most deadly of our enemies. I know, there are those who say, ‘only after Arafat.’ ‘Arafat is the evil, not all the palestinians. Despite Abu Mazen’s past, maybe he will be able to prove himself. And if not him, someone after him.’

Yesterday an Israeli minister commented on the present situation during an interview on Ga’ali Tzahal.  He has a unique solution to the problem at hand. He suggested that the so-called palestinians accept Jordan as heart of their ‘state,’ a state which will include ‘branches’ throughout Judea, Samaria and Gaza. He said, and I quote, “The palestinians should also be privileged to a national identity and that identity can be expressed by a palestinian state based around Jordan, with branches in Judea and Samaria, in the area [classified] A.” Area A, about 40% of Yesha, is land abandoned to the PA as part of the Oslo Accords, and includes Shechem, Ramallah, Bethlehem, and others. Israel moved back into all these cities a year ago, following the Passover Massacre at the Park Hotel in Netanya and has remained, in an effort to thwart further terrorism.

The minister said that personally he wouldn’t want to abandon land in Yesha, but that the previous government already did, and that the Israeli army’s presence in these cities is only temporary because the world has already recognized the palestinian existence. A palestinian army and parliament will be that of the Jordanians, with scattered ‘branches’ throughout Yesha. He added, “Unfortunately, this is the situation which has been created. We don’t agree. It is our right to live on all parts of Eretz Yisrael, but we cannot now fulfill this, not in Ramallah, Jenin or Shechem.”

Of course, all of these concessions, says the minister, are dependent on stopping the terror, incitement, etc. etc.

So I ask you to name the minister. Who could it be? Maybe a weak Likudnik, under the influence of Ariel Sharon? Maybe Bibi, who gave away Hebron and signed the Wye Accords? Or perhaps someone from the Shinui party, who is trying to acquiesce politely, thereby soothing the feelings of the ‘settlers’ while, at the same time, disagreeing with them?

No, my friends, not Likud, not Shinui, no, we are talking about Welfare Minister Zevulun Orlev, of the National Religious Party, the Mafdal.

I read this interview earlier today on the Arutz 7 website in Hebrew, then read it again and again. The words stayed the same each time.

So, how to react, that is the question?

First of all – Arafat is not just a person. Arafat is a concept. Even post-Arafat, Arafat will still exist. Arafat personifies the aspirations of the Arabs – that being, of course, the annihilation of the State of Israel. It makes no difference who inherits Arafat, or who inherits his successor. It must be understood, and it is as clear as daylight. They don’t want us here and will do anything and everything, even if it takes them generations to try and achieve their goal. Call it a Trojan horse, as did Faisal Husseini. Call it fragmentation of Israeli society, as did Abu Mazen – divide and conquer, call it whatever you want. The end result of any equation is always the same – get the Jews out of Israel.

Second – it makes no difference what they say or what they do – they could be the most wonderful peace-loving people in the universe. That does not change one iota the fact that Eretz Yisrael belongs to Am Yisrael – the Land of Israel belongs to the Jewish people. G-d gave us this land, He brought us back to the land after a two thousand year exile, and He made the land prosper. It is written in the Talmud that the sign of redemption is when the Land of Israel flourishes, when plants and flower grow, when the trees are rich with fruit. As long as the Jews were in exile the land was desolate – no agriculture, no nothing, until the Jews returned. Then, again, the land blossomed in all its glory.

Third – According to Jewish law, a person doesn’t have the right to commit suicide, because our life is not ours, it is G-d’s. He gave it to us and He will take it from us. We don’t have anything to say about it. Ditto, causing bodily harm to oneself.  I cannot cut off my arm or finger, or anything else, because my body is a gift from Above. And the same is true with Eretz Yisrael. It is not ours to cut up, to give away, to abandon. And especially not to our worst enemies.

Zevulun Orlev’s ideas are tantamount to Jews sitting down at the negotiating table with the Nazi leadership. They are equivalent to participating in a Holocaust. Holocaust number two, G-d forbid, the destruction of the State of Israel. One Holocaust was one too many. Let’s not help in bringing about another one.

With blessings from Hebron,

This is David Wilder 

Where are the Voices of Conscience?

Where are the Voices of Conscience?

April 21, 2003

Shalom.

Everyone seems to be standing in line to shake his hand, to give him a hug, wish him luck, and help him on his way to eternal fame and glory. George Bush will invite him to the White House. Tony Blair at 10 Downing Street. And even our Israeli Prime Minister, Ariel Sharon, in Jerusalem. He is considered to be a moderate, something of a statesman, the ideal peace-partner.

A dream come true. Or is it. There are a few problems in the way of this perfect man. Mahmoud Abbas, otherwise known as Abu Mazen, was a founder of Arafat’s Fatah, the backbone of the murderous PLO terror organization.  One might expect that over the years, perhaps his ideas and views have mellowed. However, that does not seem to be the case.

For example, several quotes taken from interviews with Abu Mazen, translated and posted by “The Middle East Media Research Institute” (Memri – www.memri.org):

1.     The Right of Return means a return to Israel and not to the Palestinian state... because it is from there that [the Palestinians] were driven out and it is there that their property is found

2.     "We were not prepared to limit the number of refugees who would be allowed to return, even if they had proposed a number of three million refugees

3.     The lands occupied [by Israel] in 1967 must be returned. All the Arab countries that fought Israel have regained their lands and therefore, it is our right to get our lands back as well. We consider Jerusalem an occupied territory.

4.     I challenge the assertion [that there has ever been a Jewish temple.]

Presently, Abu Mazen’s candidacy for Prime Minister may be in jeopardy, because he is insisting that Muhammad Dahlan be appointed minister for internal security in his government. Abu Mazen and Muhammad Dahlan have been known to very close, for quite a long time. Who is Dahlan? Just a few examples:

1.     Dahlan is known to have ordered the bomb attack on the children’s school bus in Kfar Darom, an explosion that cost two Israeli lives and the legs of  the three Cohen children.

2.     He personally ordered production of tens of thousands of mortars, used to attack communities in Gaza; mortars which have also hit Sderot and other Israeli communities outside of Gaza.

3.     Together with Jibril Rajoub in Hebron, Dahlan orchestrated the beginning of the current Olso War, commanding Arafat’s forces in Gaza.

This is one of Prime Minister Abu Mazen’s closest associates, so important that he would forfeit his position should the Dahlan appointment not be approved by Arafat.

On March third of this year Abu Mazen said, “We have not said that we will stop the armed struggle,” thereby renewing his commitment to armed combat against Israelis. Only four days later, on a Friday night, terrorists murdered Rabbi Eli and Dina Horowitz in Kiryat Arba. Recently Mrs. Bernice Wolf, Dina Horowitz’ mother filed a complaint with the Israeli police against Abu Mazen, charging him with incitement to murder.

But perhaps the most stinging indictment against this terrorist politician is his doctoral dissertation The Other Side: The Secret Relationship between Nazism and the Zionist Movement. According to Memri: “In the introduction to his 1984 study, Abu Mazen referred to well-known Holocaust deniers, raised doubts that gas chambers were used for extermination of Jews, and claimed that the number of Jews murdered in the Holocaust might be "even less than a million." Abu Mazen claimed that the Zionist movement had a stake in convincing world public opinion that the number of victims was high; thus, it would achieve "greater gains" after the war when the time came to "distribute the spoils."

The central claim Abu Mazen sought to prove is that the Zionist movement, with all its factions, conspired against the Jewish people and collaborated with the Nazis to annihilate it, because the movement considered "Palestine" the only appropriate destination for Jewish emigration.

Abu Mazen wrote, “Many scholars have debated the question of the 6 million figure, and reached perplexing conclusions, according to which the Jewish victims total hundreds of thousands.”

A few days ago Nazi hunter Simon Wiesenthal announced his retirement, saying, “I found the mass-murderers I sought, and I have lived longer than the others.  If there are those whom I haven't sought, they're now too old to be tried." He continued, “"It's hard to get the public to really understand the crimes that these people committed.  I still have to struggle with people and groups who say that the Holocaust never happened."

This being the case, it is difficult to understand why the Wiesenthal Center has refused to release a full English translation of  Abu Mazen’s thesis. Despite requests by major Jewish organizations around the world, the Center has consistently refused to acknowledge that it even has a copy of this document.

One would expect such renowned people, such as Wiesenthal and Holocaust survivor-author, Nobel Laureate  Elie Weisel, to publicly renounce Abu Mazen and his Holocaust-denial writings. In a book titled “One Generation After” in 1965, Weisel writes, “Had all of them (Holocaust survivors) remained mute, their accumulated silences would have become unbearable: the impact would have deafened the world…Still, the story had to be told. It needed to be told for the sake of our children, so that they will know where they come from, what their heritage is.”

The original title of Elie Wiesel's "Night" was "Un die velt hot geshviegen"--"And the World Was Silent."  Why is Mr. Wiesel silent now?  In 1966, Elie Wiesel published "The Jews of Silence."  It was an indictment of the reticence of world Jewry to speak out about the plight of our brethren behind the Iron Curtain.  Why is Mr. Wiesel a "Jew of silence" on the issue of Holocaust denial now?

When President Ronald Reagan announced that he would visit the Bitburg Cemetery where some SS-men were interred, Mr. Wiesel pleaded with the President not to go, famously telling him that the President's place is not that place.  I would say the same: Mr. Wiesel, your place is with those of us who shun Abu Mazen and refuse to deal with a man of such monstrous theories.

George Bush, Tony Blair and Ariel Sharon are about to join hands with a terrorist who believes that Jerusalem belongs to the Arabs, that a Temple never existed, that millions of so-called refugees should be allowed ‘back’ into ‘Israel proper’, and that during World War Two, only a  “few hundred thousand Jews were killed.”  Next week we mark “Holocaust Memorial Day,” in memory of the millions of dead. What would be more appropriate at this time than a full condemnation of Mahmoud Abbas and his denial of the Holocaust? I call on the voices of conscious of the Jewish people to cry out, denouncing the denial of our people’s heritage, decrying the refutation of the mass slaughter that decimated between six to seven million Jews, some sixty years ago. Perhaps the cultured world isn’t interested in hearing a voice from Hebron, but the voices of Simon Wiesenthal and Eli Wiesel would be hard to ignore.

With blessings from Hebron,

This is David Wilder

Destined from Birth

Destined from Birth

By David Wilder

The Jewish Community of Hebron

April 7, 2003

Shalom.

Every once in a while it’s nice to skip the heavy stuff and write about lighter, happier, events. True, the present situation is such that it’s not difficult to find something of major importance to deal with, but in all honesty, I’m a little tired of it. After all, what can I say tonight that hasn’t been already said, or written?

So tonight I’m going to take a break from Iraq and the road map and tell you a true story, which I find kind of amazing.

This story starts in Turkey and Yemin, in Buffalo and the Bronx. From these far parts of the world two couples met and married, some 20 to 30 years ago. For the sake of this article, let’s call them Avraham and Sarah, and Ya’akov and Leah. Avraham, originally from Yemin, lived in Israel before making his way to the United States. There he met Sarah, born in Turkey. They lived all the way up in north New York, in Buffalo. There Sarah gave birth to a daughter.

Avraham met and befriended Ya’akov. When Ya’akov married Leah, the two couples became close friends, enjoying each other’s company. When Leah became pregnant she tried to convince Sarah that she should have another child – what fun it would be to bring up their children together. Leah was very persuasive, and the two women gave birth three weeks apart – Sarah to a second girl, Rivka, and Leah to her first child, a son, Yosef. The two women have pictures of themselves sitting next to each other before giving birth, each with a large stomach, showing the stages of their pregnancy. After the children were born, the friendship continued, with two babies frequently sleeping in the same carriage, especially on the Sabbath, when the two families would eat their afternoon meal together.

As is the way of the world, the two families went their distinctive ways. Avraham and Sarah remained in Buffalo, while Ya’akov and Leah moved to Israel. They remained in touch from afar, but it wasn’t the same as living next to each other.

Then a few years ago, Avraham and Sarah too, returned to Israel. Once again the couples renewed their close friendship, frequently visiting each other and joining in their respective family celebrations. The children were older, and becoming acquainted with one another, became friends. A couple of years ago Ya’akov and Leah’s son Yosef realized that he more than liked Rivka, and one day, told her so. Thinking about it, she realized that the feelings were reciprocal, and their relationship deepened. After finishing high school she began studying in a women’s religious seminar in Yosef’s home town. It wasn’t long before the young couple became engaged, and early last week, married. Their wedding was a beautiful affair, with the Huppah, the actual wedding ceremony taking place outside in a field surrounded by trees and blooming flowers. The wedding pictures glow with a fading sunlight, and a darkening deep blue sky. And of course, the pictures glow with the apparent deep love between Yosef and Rivka.

I couldn’t help but realize, while reflecting on the week’s festivity, the Divine wonders of our universe. It seems like a cross between a fairy-tale and an impossible dream. Two people, born days apart, but then living worlds apart, only to be reunited, to fall in love and to marry, in Israel. It just doesn’t seem real. But it is real, very real. And very beautiful too.

So why spend tonight’s commentary time telling you this story? Sometimes, when we face what seem to be unfathomable problems, we look for a sign, something, a hint from

Above, that everything will be OK. The problem is that sometimes that signal can come right up to us and almost punch us in the nose, yet we take no notice. What we expect to see, and what actually happens, can be two very different things.

And as strange as it may sound, I view last week’s wedding between these two young people as something of a sign from the heavens, reminding us, if we should really be in need of such a reminder, that, yes, there is a G-d, who is watching over us, who is pulling the strings, who is making the world turn. At times events can become so overpowering that we tend to forget – for a moment we actually believe that our fate is in the hands of people, people identified as world leaders, or as the scrounge of the universe. Sometimes we reach a point where we actually believe that if we do or neglect to do ‘this’ or ‘that,’ it will be a deciding factor in our existence, or G-d forbid, our destruction.

It is true, what we do or don’t do does make a difference, sometimes an important difference. But the deciding factor is not our doing, rather, it is His. And anyone who thinks differently, remember that the Jewish people managed to survive a two thousand year old exile from our homeland, exile from Spain, England and other countries, and finally, a holocaust, only to find ourselves back in our ancient homeland, building, developing and prospering, against all worldly odds.

So too it is today – despite the difficulties, we must not, under any circumstances, fall into despair. True, our situation does not look good, but then again, neither did it look good to those poor souls encaged in Aushwitz.

And really, all it takes is something which, on the face of it, is small and insignificant, to push us back on the right track – something like the marriage of two people who were destined from birth, or even before birth, to join in holy matrimony. As our sages have taught, forty days before conception a voice from heaven announces, the daughter of so and so will marry the son of so and so. And so it is.

With blessings from Hebron,

This is David Wilder