Taxpayer Funded Public Relations for the Palestinians
By: Sarah Stern and Kyle Shideler
Last week, Israeli newspaper Yedioth Aharonoth reported that American Taxpayer dollars, a quarter of a million dollars through USAID, were being used to fund a series of advertisements in Israel, featuring leaders of the Palestinian Authority assuring Israeli citizens that they are reliable partners for peace and asking Israelis to be the same. Newswire UPI summarized the ads saying:
The campaign launched Sunday includes the faces of senior Palestinian Authority officials Saeb Erekat, Jibril Rajoub and Yasser Abed Rabo and Riad Malki, Palestinian foreign affairs minister, Yedioth Aharonoth said.
The aim of the campaign is to persuade Israelis that peace partners on the Palestinian side truly exist, and calls for support of a two-state solution, the Tel Aviv newspaper said.
The U.S. government was approached to fund the campaign by the Geneva Initiative founders, who drew up an agreement in 2003 to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the newspaper said.
The Geneva Initiative is an Israeli NGO, which receives funding from several foreign governments, including the United States, European Union and Switzerland.
It is utterly inappropriate that the United States should be paying to conduct a political campaign intended to alter the perceptions of a fellow democracy. And in any case, such a move will not have the desired effect. Says Asher Fredman of NGO Monitor, writing in the Jewish Telegraphic Agency:
Many Israelis view the Geneva Initiative as an opposition political movement run by a small group involved in the unsuccessful Oslo negotiations that failed to receive support in the democratic process. Its proposed peace agreement also includes aspects that have been unacceptable to most Israelis, including inadequate security provisions and a highly ambiguous framework for dealing with refugee claims. The foreign government funding for the campaign has not contributed to its public acceptance…
Thus, the USAID alliance with the Geneva Initiative and the funding for a slick advertising campaign are unlikely to have the intended impact.
What the Israeli public knows, and what the U.S government continues to ignore is that the Palestinian leadership is NOT a partner for peace. The Fatah leaders selected by the Geneva Initiative to speak out in this campaign illustrate that fact perfectly.
Take for instance, Jibril Rajoub, whom Middle East Analyst Caroline Glick describes thusly:
…on the list of US-funded spokesmen was Fatah strongman Jibril Rajoub, who was instrumental in forging the operational alliance between Fatah and Hamas that facilitated the terror war against Israel 10 years ago. Throughout the roaring ’90s, Rajoub assiduously recruited Hamas members to his Preventive Security Force in Judea and Samaria.
As recently as May 10 he appeared on PA television and said, “Building a school and throwing a hand grenade, in my opinion, are resistance. I build the school in order to strengthen the reasons for my people’s resolve, as one of several aspects of the resistance, and when there is a need to throw a grenade [or launch] a rocket, I’ll do that as well out of my belief in the inevitable victory of my cause and its justness.”
Last week the US paid for him to be filmed telling Israelis we should trust him.
Glick also points out that Palestinian negotiators Saeb Erekat and Yasser Abed Rabbo continue to spout outrageous blood libels regarding Israel’s Operation Defensive Shield in 2002.
Other PLO and Fatah bigwigs continue to prove intransigent. Just last July, Saeb Erekat, who USAID is funding to tell Israeli citizens what a good partner for peace he is, told a Syrian newspaper that there would be no negotiations without a continued settlement freeze.
Incitement is not limited to just the Palestinian elite. Instead, through Media and education, it is filtered down to every level of Palestinian society. Recently, Palestinian Media Watch, which monitors Palestinian incitement, reports that Official Palestinian Television continues to tell Palestinian children that Israeli cities of Jaffa, Lod, Ramie and Acre, are all occupied Palestinian cities which will one day be controlled by the Palestinians. The Institute for Monitoring Peace and Cultural Tolerance in School Education (IMPACT-SE), which monitors both Israel and Palestinian textbooks, is preparing to release a report which will show that Palestinian education remains filled with incitement to violence, which continues to describe Jews as nefarious creatures, and continue to idolize martyrs and the armed struggle.
The premise that it is the Israeli people who are not ready for peace is absurd in the extreme. History has shown us that time and again, the Israeli people have acquiesced to negotiations, and even unilateral withdrawals, in the hopes of producing some kind of peaceful settlement. It is the Palestinian people who need to be released from a world-view of incitement and propaganda. Says Palestinian Journalist Khaled Abu Toameh:
In order for the peace talks to make progress, there is a need to prepare the Palestinian public opinion for the possibility of compromise and concessions with Israel. But the Palestinian leadership’s message these days sounds more apologetic than conciliatory. The message is mostly aimed at justifying Abbas’s decision to negotiate with Israel unconditionally. It also sounds as if the Palestinian Authority is telling its people that it decided to go to the talks only due to heavy pressure from the Americans and Europeans.
One has to wonder why, therefore, with the proven track record of Israel having had exchanged a valuable tangible, land, for empty promises of peace, our American taxpayers are paying for a campaign that whitewashes the words and deeds of the Palestinians, in Hebrew for the Israelis. Why have we moved from being an objective arbitrator, or referee, to a coach for one particular team?
100% right on the spot, but alas! nobody is listening – taking “good care” of the Iranian problem would be the solution to many illnesses of the ME……..but we seem to have lost that capacity to take decision and to take the initiative…….like everything else in life……our policy is inflationary, where the definition of inflation is that the quality diminisces and the quantity grows….
100% right on the spot, but alas! nobody is listening – taking “good care” of the Iranian problem would be the solution to many illnesses of the ME……..but we seem to have lost the capacity to take decision and to take the initiative…….like everything else in life……our policy is inflationary, where the definition of inflation is that the quality diminisces and the quantity grows….