One reason, no doubt, is that to the UN and much of the world, Palestinian terrorism does not have the obvious ties to Islamism that Boko Haram and ISIS and Al Qaeda do. While of course the UN never mentions Islam in connection to terror, it does speak quote a bit about "violent extremism and radical ideology that lead to terrorism" and to them, the Palestinians are using terrorism as a political tool, not as an expression of extremist ideology. The last thing the UN wants is to call this a religious conflict because that would make it indistinguishable from the other Islamist attacks.
But the Palestinians, among themselves, freely agree that this is a religious conflict.
The Amad.ps website has an article by Suhalia Omar today that says "Arab people conscious of the dangers of Zionism and realize that our struggle with Israel is not a conflict between Palestinians and Israelis, but an eternal battle between Jews and Muslims, a religious conflict manifested in the Holy Qur'an, which listed the Jews' history in detail and which gives them all bad descriptions starting from monkeys and pigs and killers of prophets and breakers of covenants...Arab Muslims are studying this history well and every verse reminds them of the dangers of Judaism, and these are increased when they see with their own eyes own tragedies that befell the Palestinians because of the Israeli occupation. They see how the Palestinian people became refugees homeless after the Jews robbed them of their territory..."
Another story from today in the Arab media talks about a new music video from Miral Ayyad, a teenage Palestinian girl who was a contestant in the Arab children's version of The Voice. The video is called "Enraged" and it encourages a new intifada while it incites the viewers with pictures of Al Aqsa juxtaposed with photos of Jews walking in the Old City.
While the PLO and Saeb Erekat warn the West that Israel is trying to turn this into a religious war, for the Palestinians, it has been that way from the start - in the most recent iteration, with Abbas saying he won't allow Jews to visit Judaism's holiest spot with their "filthy feet."
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