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Cooper: World’s silent acquiescence of Palestinian Jew-hatred is helping to destroy any chance for

There have been repeated calls for President Barack Obama and the leaders of the P5+1 to denounce the Ayatollah Khamenei’s genocidal threats against the Jewish state.
[additional-authors]
June 8, 2015

There have been repeated calls for President Barack Obama and the leaders of the P5+1 to denounce the Ayatollah Khamenei’s genocidal threats against the Jewish state. No such public protest has been or is likely to be made in the frantic push leading up to the June 30th deadline for a nuclear deal with Tehran.  President Obama has made it clear that he sees the Iranian regime’s anti-Semitic rants as meant only for internal consumption, with no broader global impact.

I guess the same mindset informs US Secretary of State John Kerry and European Union leaders who also maintain a public silence as Palestinian leadership—The Palestinian Authority (PA), not only Hamas– continue to deploy Jew-hatred in the society they control. World leaders apparently want to focus all their diplomatic energies on “the bigger picture”. Denouncing Palestinian anti-Semitism would deflect attention from the ultimate goal: A Two-State solution that would birth a Palestinian state and assure Israel’s security.

But they are dead wrong. Silence in the face of hate may actually be helping to kill any chances for peace in our time.

Two recent developments in recent days, one in Hamas-controlled Gaza and the other in the PA-controlled West Bank, reveal the depths of officially sanctioned anti-Semitic depravity on full-blown public display in Palestinian society.

Last Sunday, the Palestine Cup Final took place in Gaza between Shujaeiya and Rafah soccer clubs. One can only imagine the enthusiasm of local sports fans to cheer their respective teams at this pivotal match. For a few hours, at least, young people in Gaza could escape the harsh reality of the seemingly endless confrontation between Hamas and Israel. But that was not be. Before the match, the above flyer was distributed on the streets of Gaza. It presents the game as a playoff between the kidnappers of Oron Shaul and the killers of Hadar Goldin, Israelis, both killed in the Protective Edge confrontation last summer but whose bodies continue to be held captive by Hamas.

The other incident was broadcast on a local Palestinian television station on June 1st and translated by MEMRI:

At a graduation ceremony of a kindergarten, sponsored by a women’s charity organization in the West Bank town of Anabta, preschoolers wearing uniforms and carrying toy guns performed a song routine. A picture of PLO founder, Yasser Arafat is visible on stage.

Here is an excerpt of one of the songs these little kids performed:

“On the mountains, behind the hills, within the valleys – you will be defeated, you will be defeated. Whether you come by land, by sea, or by air – you will be crushed, you will be crushed. If you stretch your hand, it will be chopped off. If you just look with your eye, it will be gouged out. The defeated army will be too terrified to come back. We come for you before, and woe betide you if we come back again. You come to this land alive, but you will leave it as body part. On the mountains, behind the hills, within the valleys – you will be defeated, you will be defeated. Whether you come by land, by sea, or by air – you will be crushed, you will be crushed. ”

[Click here to view this clip on MEMRI TV]

The Gaza flyer and the West Bank broadcast came just as Israelis paused to mark the first Yahrtzeit of three teenage boys who were kidnapped from a bus stop and brutally murdered by Palestinian terrorists, a particularly heinous crime that touched every Israeli home.

These two horrific incidents and countless other examples of Palestinian Jew-hatred are poisoning the already depleted well of peace, and leaves appalled Israelis- of all political affiliations– facing this fundamental question: “One State, Two States, or Three States: Are these people who we are supposed to believe are ready to live with us in peace?”

The history of grand peace processes for The Holy Land, dating back to Bill Clinton, has been a history of false dawns. In 2015, with the entire Middle East aflame and littered with failed states, it is hard to see how President Obama working with French President Hollande on a UN Security Council scheme can succeed in forcing a timetable for peace.

Not even the findings of a new Rand Corporation Study that a Two State solution could create a windfall of $173 billion dollars over ten years, is likely alone to incentivize the two ruling factions who dominate Palestinian political and social life to stop their cancerous hatred of Israelis.

PA President Abbas is clear what he wants and that he expects the international community to deliver a state. But no Israeli leader—whether Bibi or Boogie—can bring his nation to the negotiating table unless the genocidal hate stops. Only the world leaders, whose largess—financial and diplomatic—legitimizes Palestinian aspirations, can make that happen.

It is past due for Presidents Obama, Hollande, Prime Minister Cameron, and Chancellor Merkel to tell the Palestinians: If you actually want your own state, then prove- to your Israeli neighbors in word and deed– that Palestinians are finally ready to tell their young that a state means embracing peace, not preparing for the next war.

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