Myths and Facts of the Mideast conflict by Marshall Roth http://aish.com/issues/jewishpeople/Myths_and_Facts_Mideast_conflict.asp With so much information available about the Mideast conflict, forming an intelligent opinion requires distinguishing the myths from the facts. MYTHS: 1. Israel is using excessive force. 2. Israel is the obstacle to peace. 3. Israel is the aggressor. 4. Sharon's visit provoked the riots. 5. Jerusalem is more holy to Moslems than to Jews. 6. Palestinians will reliably safeguard holy sites. 1. Israel is using excessive force. FACT: Israeli military reaction has been one of incomparable restraint. After the brutal lynching of two Israelis in Ramallah, Israel limited its response to bombing one floor of the headquarters of the negligent Ramallah police, the radio station that had been broadcasting incitement to violence, and two targets in Gaza. Israelis gave a 3-hour warning, to allow Palestinians to evacuate; indeed, no one was killed. Similarly, following the recent torching of an ancient synagogue in Jericho, Israel's only response was to bomb a military training school. On the front lines of this "intifada," Israeli soldiers have orders not to shoot unless they are in direct danger. Israeli soldiers are told never shoot at an ambulance or at women. Unless the Palestinians begin shooting first with live bullets, Israeli soldiers are instructed never to shoot to kill, and then, to aim only at the source of the shooting, never randomly. No other army has such restrained orders. As the world decries the 100 Palestinian deaths, no one stops to ask how many would be dead if Israeli forces were actually doing what they are accused of -- shooting indiscriminately into crowds with automatic weapons. If that were the case, many thousands of Palestinians would be dead. But what about Palestinians youth who have been tragically killed in the fighting? What kind of parent encourages children to go to the front lines to throw stones and firebombs at armed troops?! Palestinians know that Israelis are reluctant to shoot at children; and if a child does wind up getting killed, it makes for excellent anti-Israel propaganda. Children are taught in school the heroics of dying as a martyr for the Palestinian cause. The Jerusalem Post reported that the Palestinian Authority is encouraging children to participate in clashes by offering their families $300 per injury and $2,000 for anyone killed. How tragic that Palestinians send their children at risk of death and then cynically use this against Israel in the court of world opinion. But perhaps Israel should not be using force at all to stop the violence? The BBC recently asked a member of the Palestinian Legislative Council if Arafat truly had the power to stop the mob violence. He replied that it probably could not be done without exerting fatal force on the rioters. Given that reality, how can the world possibly expect Israel to stop the violence without such force? It is the duty of any government to protect its citizens from violence. Imagine what the response would be if this violence was occurring to any other country. During "Black September" when Palestinians rioted in Jordan in the 1970s, King Hussein massacred 10,000 Palestinians in a few days. Likewise, Syrian President Assad slaughtered 20,000 of his own people during civil unrest in Hama. 2. Israel is escalating events towards war. If Israel was really interested in peace, they would cease the violence and continue the peace process. FACT: The last thing Israel wants is war. Never has there been a more dovish government in the history of Israel. Barak is offering full recognition to the first independent Palestinian state in history. He is making territorial concessions that include 99 percent of the West Bank, plus the strategically vital Jordan valley. He is even willing to give up the Temple Mount and make Israel's rights to its own capital negotiable. Barak has made every concession he can possibly make to avoid war. He has no more left to give. A.B. Yehoshua, Israel's best-known literary figure and a longtime peace activist, told Newsweek: "Barak had offered [Arafat] things that even I as a permanent dove, even a zealous dove, couldn't imagine an Israeli leader would offer." We ask: What is the source of the Palestinian frustration? What concessions are they still lacking to have resorted to such violence? Even the Americans, whose role as a mediator demands total objectivity, have made clear where the fault lies. After Camp David, President Clinton said that if not for Arafat's consistent refusal, there would have been a peace agreement signed, with Jerusalem as the capital of the Palestinian state. And Madeline Albright recently said on ABC's "This Week": "We all know Arafat is in charge of the Palestinian Authority. He has the responsibility for controlling the violence, and we think he should do more." If in fact Arafat cannot control the violence, then the Palestinian people are out of control and any slight provocation can be expected to produce violent response. How then can Israel trust any peace agreement? 3. The fact that a majority of deaths are Palestinians, makes them the victim and Israel the aggressor. FACT: "Aggressor" implies that Israel is somehow responsible for initiating the violence. In fact, the Palestinians have created the climate of violence. Within months of the Oslo agreement of 1993, Arafat gave a speech in South Africa promising jihad for Jerusalem, a call he has consistently repeated in the Arabic press. Today, the Palestine Authority's official maps and children's textbooks treat Israel as nonexistent -- and show the Palestinian state stretching all the way to the Mediterranean Sea. The PLO Charter still calls for the destruction of the State of Israel. The Palestinian violence is fueled in part by Islamic doctrine. The Koran calls for "eviction by the sword" of any non-Moslem entity holding sovereignty over land in the Arabian Peninsula. In other words, annihilation of the Jews is an Islamic religious obligation, hence the term jihad -- "holy war.' In fact, official Palestinian TV, radio and newspapers have urged people to blood and martyrdom. The day before an Israeli soldier was dragged through the streets of Ramallah tied to the back of an automobile, official Palestinian TV depicted the scene of a mannequin tied and dragged by an automobile. Following is excerpt of a sermon broadcast live on October 13, 2000 by the official Palestinian Authority television. The speaker is Dr. Ahmad Abu Halabiya, Member of the PA appointed "Fatwa Council" and former acting Rector of the Islamic University in Gaza: "O brother believers, the criminals, the terrorists are the Jews, who have butchered our children, orphaned them, widowed our women and desecrated our holy places and sacred sites. They are the terrorists. They are the ones who must be butchered and killed, as Allah the Almighty said: Fight them: Allah will torture them at your hands... "This is the truth, O Brothers in belief. From here, Allah the almighty has called upon us not to ally with the Jews or the Christians, not to like them, not to become their partners, not to support them, and not to sign agreements with them... "Even if an agreement for Gaza is signed, we shall not forget Haifa, and Acre, and the Galilee, and Jaffa, and the Triangle and the Negev, and the rest of our cities and villages. It is only a matter of time... "Have no mercy on the Jews, no matter where they are, in any country. Fight them, wherever you are. Wherever you meet them, kill them. Wherever you are, kill those Jews and those Americans who are like them..." Throughout the current wave of violence, Arafat has refused to call on his people to stop the rioting, shooting and firebombing. This is in direct violation of the Oslo Accords and other signed agreements between Israel and the Palestinians. For example: Commitment to the peaceful resolution of the conflict and that outstanding permanent status issues will be resolved through negotiations (Arafat's Letter to Rabin, September 9, 1993). Abstention from incitement, including hostile propaganda and adoption of legal measures to prevent such incitement (Interim Agreement, Article XXII). Adoption of all necessary measures to prevent acts of terrorism, crime and hostilities and taking of legal measures against offenders (Gaza-Jericho Agreement, Article XVIII; Interim Agreement, Article XV). The Palestinian Police will act systematically against all expressions of violence and terror (Interim Agreement, Annex I, Article 11.1). Palestinian side will make known its policy of zero tolerance for terror and violence against both sides (Wye River Memorandum, Article II.A. la). 4. Ariel Sharon's visit to the Temple Mount provoked the riots. FACT: Sharon came to the Temple Mount unarmed and without violence. Palestinians say he shouldn't have been there in the first place. Yet the Temple Mount is open to visits by people of all faiths. Furthermore, why should the Moslem claim to their third-holiest site override Sharon's right as a Jew to set foot on the single most holy place for Jews? Sharon's visit was an excuse for violence, not the real reason. Days before Sharon's visit, Arafat met with the tanzim, his armed militia, and told them to "be ready." Palestinian violence had already begun before Sharon's visit. The prior week, an Israeli Border Patrol soldier was murdered by a double roadside bomb inside of Israel. The morning before Sharon's visit to the Mount, a Palestinian policeman, on a joint patrol with an Israeli partner, used his automatic rifle to murder his partner, and then wounded another Israeli policeman. The rioting that followed Sharon's visit was not spontaneous. When Sharon ascended the Mount, he saw the mounds of boulders which had been prepared in advance for pelting Jewish worshipers at the Western Wall below. The next day, the preacher at al Aqsa mosque called at prayers to "eradicate the Jews from Palestine." Official Palestine television began playing over and over archival footage of the Palestinian intifada of 1987-1993 showing young people out in the streets throwing stones. Arafat then closed the schools and declared a general strike, causing everyone to go out into the street. 5. Jerusalem and the Temple Mount is a holy site more central to Islam than it is to Judaism. FACT: Arafat accuses Israel of attempting to "Judaize Jerusalem," further corroborating his deep-seated belief that Jews are interlopers in the Holy City. Arafat knows that once the legitimate religious connection of Jews is removed from the land, then the continued physical presence of Jews in the land can eventually be called into question. In fact: Jerusalem was founded 3,000 years ago by King David, as the capital of Israel. Mohammed was never in Jerusalem in his lifetime. Jerusalem is mentioned over 700 times in the Jewish Bible, and not once in the Koran. Jews pray facing Jerusalem, wherever they are in the world. Moslems at the mosque in Jerusalem pray with their backs toward Jerusalem. For over 3,000 years, Jerusalem has always been the Jewish capital, but never once the capital of an Arab or Muslim entity. In the 20 years that Jordan occupied Jerusalem (1948-1967), they never sought to make it their capital, nor did Palestinians demand it as theirs. 6. Palestinians can be relied upon to safeguard holy sites. FACT: Following the unification of Jerusalem in 1967, the Israelis acted quickly to normalize Moslem rights to pray on the Temple Mount, despite the fact that the Temple Mount is the holiest site in Judaism. By contrast, during the years when the Old City was under Arab control (from 1948-67), Jews were fully barred from ever visiting the Western Wall. Indeed, the only time in history of unlimited access to all religions to their holy sites in the Old City was under Israeli control of the Old City since 1967. Most recently, in an agreement worked out by both sides, the Palestinians promised to protect the Jewish shrine at Joseph's Tomb. But within minutes of Israeli withdrawal, Palestinian masses stormed the tomb, tore up prayer books, and burned, desecrated and destroyed the Jewish holy site brick by brick. Jews are now barred from the site, and Palestinians are building a mosque in its stead. Mosque translation courtesy of the Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI).