Abu Mazen is at the end of his political path and detached from reality • His speech at the Arab League conference was a confused anti-Semitic manifesto • Commentary
Unfaithful to the facts of Abu Mazen // Photography // AFP
Nearly two decades ago, in the midst of the intifada, as Israel battled the rising wave of terror, then-prime minister Ariel Sharon complained that Palestinian leaders were cryers and that Abu Mazen, then Palestinian prime minister under Yasser Arafat, was "a chick who has not yet grown feathers" . I want to say, a leader at the beginning of his path, insecure and capable of execution, and hence Israel cannot really trust him and trust in his word. If Sharon was with us today, he would probably reiterate that Abbas remained in Kain and that the same chick he met two decades ago still remains.
But the truth is that Abu Mazen, who yesterday asked the Arab League council to seek its sponsorship, is no longer a leader at the beginning, but the exact opposite. He is an 85-year-old leader who is at the end of his political journey, detached from reality, and is primarily concerned with how he will be remembered for history and the legacy he leaves behind to his people.
Abbas was not at his best yesterday, and in his speech to the Arab League Council much to be confused and did not control the facts, dates and even names. His aides repeatedly assisted him from the sidelines, whenever he became confused or forgot something. Still, his message was clear, according to which he still clung to the dream and unwilling to compromise and accept reality, not even for his people, and he did not want to be remembered by posterity as one who was true to Luther even one of the historical claims of the Palestinians. That is why he is rejecting the Trump plan altogether and will continue to reject any proposals in the future that will not answer all of his claims.
Alongside the call for world aid, Abu Mazen's speech included several noteworthy gems, indicating the gaping gap between him and Israel. He explained that he would never recognize Israel as the state of the Jewish people, because "many of its inhabitants, and perhaps most of them, are not Jews", whether close to two million Arabs, but also those who immigrated to it from Russia and Ethiopia, and, he said, bought their Judaism for a few rubles. Abbas apparently already considers himself Jewish in authority because of his doctoral dissertation, which he wrote in Moscow during the Soviet era on "Nazi-Zionist relations", claiming, among other things, that the number of Jews murdered by the Nazis was exaggerated.
Mahmoud Abbas also rejected the proposal to move the triangle to the Palestinian Authority, saying that he expressed his contempt for Arab leaders in Israel: "Do not want the triangle with Tibi and another, or whatever they are called." In this regard, Abu Mazen can be believed that he does not want the Arab citizens of Israel as residents of his state, because these have become too Israeli for him. But especially, they do not want their leaders, who may be attracting attention in Israel, but in the Arab world they despise and ridicule, and that in every other Arab country there was already someone who cares to show them their place.
But the important thing in his speech was "exposing" the guilty of the Palestinians' disaster. It turns out, according to Abu Mazen, that it was the US at large that supported the Balfour Declaration, and not just the United Kingdom, and it also turns out that the Americans tried to undermine the Oslo Accords that were made behind them. Well, according to Abu Mazen, Trump does not know at all what the program bears his name And this is a small group of people who deny it. In other words, a bunch of Jews run the world and throw catastrophes on the heads of others.
