RUTHFULLY YOURS

Twenty-five years ago, PLO head Yasser Arafat’s triumphant return to areas under Israeli control was accompanied by live broadcasts, with cameras filming every angle of this “gala event.” Only one photo was missing – a photo of the arch-terrorists Arafat was hiding in his car.

The Shin Bet security agency knew about these individuals and strongly opposed letting these terrorists into the country. The Rabin government also knew about the smuggling but kept mum. The public was not notified. Why destroy a pretty fantasy? That is when the strategy of deception began.

Before his return, Arafat was politically and militarily irrelevant and had been banished to faraway Tunis.  He was brought back to life by the Israeli messiahs of peace. The Israeli peace camp naively believed that, because of his weak standing, he would agree to become their partner.

Despite the promise that the initial stage of the 1994 Gaza-Jericho Agreement was merely an experiment, the leaders of Israel’s government continued making concessions while deceiving the public. The peace camp’s Palestinian obsession did not let up, even when it became glaringly obvious that there was no partner.

Even when it was revealed, after Arafat’s speech in South Africa in 1994, that when addressing an Arabic-speaking audience Arafat confessed that the peace overtures were just a stage in a plan to destroy Israel, the Israeli peace camp still clung to the plan. Even when the Second Intifada erupted in September 2000 under the auspices of the Palestinian Authority and with the help of Palestinian police officers using weapons supplied by Israel, they still held on to the dream – even when the price became a national nightmare with more than 1,000 Jews murdered.

To this day, the fantasy is still held by some, as though the Oslo Accords were still relevant. The Palestinian Authority continues to fuel anti-Israel incitement around the world using its media outlets for incitement to terrorism. We created a terror monster with our own hands in the form of 20,000 fighters armed with machine guns, pistols and armored vehicles.

The time has come to rectify the damage caused by the Oslo Accords.  Israel needs to inform the new architects of peace – U.S. representatives Jared Kusher and Jason Greenblatt – of the red line that the Israeli public would be unwilling to cross in terms of further concessions. The call must come from the victims of terrorism, who have paid the biggest price, and from the general public, without relying on the politically hamstrung Israeli government.

We cannot allow the autonomous Palestinian territories to become a Palestinian state. This would only embolden their inevitable demand for more and more territory and recognition. The establishment of a Palestinian state would boost their ability to wage political warfare. If they had a state, every IDF move toward a Palestinian village would become a whole U.N. Security Council debate, just as it was before 1967.

As religious Jews, Kushner and Greenblatt need to keep in mind the biblical directive to prevent foreign rule in this land. Any agreement with the Palestinians will inevitably turn into a war against the Jewish people in Zion.

Security control over Area A needs to be taken away from the Palestinians. There is no room for a hostile armed force in the narrow space between the sea and the Jordan Valley.

It is important to remember the victims. In the time span between the 1967 Six-Day War and the 1993 Oslo Accords, 415 Israelis were murdered in terrorist attacks. In the similar time span between the Oslo Accords and today, 1,700 Israelis have been murdered. With this kind of “peace,” who needs enemies?