They called the Israeli presence in Judea and Samaria "the elephant in the room."
This prompts me to bring up the real elephants in the room - the elephants that these human rights pretenders always ignore and want everyone else to ignore as well
I have been calling out these elephants since 2005, updating the list every few years. These are the facts that everyone knows - and that are actively suppressed by the media, politicians, academia and "experts."
Here is the latest iteration of the inconvenient facts that no one wants to discuss:
Elephant 1: Terror groups control Gaza - and that will not change
Every peace plan and proposal includes Gaza in a Palestinian Arab state, and none of them has any provision on how to handle the fact that Gaza is a terrorist haven, in much worse shape since Israel uprooted the settlements there, controlled by Iranian-funded terrorist groups that are consistently and wholeheartedly against Israel's existence. Peace is impossible with this elephant, so it is easier to pretend it isn't there - or, for some, to position the genocidal, antisemitic desires of Hamas and Islamic Jihad as somehow a brave fight for freedom.
Elephant 2: Palestinian Arabs consistently support terrorism
In the only fair, democratic elections in the territories, the Hamas terrorists were chosen by the people. Poll after poll shows that Palestinian Arabs support terror in Israel itself. (52% still support a violent intifada in 2019.) The elections and surveys proved that the conventional wisdom was wrong - and the conventional wisdom ignores and downplays this proof that peace is impossible, and it isn't Israel's fault.
Elephant 3: The current PA government was not elected
This corollary to Elephant 2 means that the people representing "Palestine" on TV and at the UN do not represent the people. Even if they sound moderate or compromising, they have no mandate. The current PA president is well past his term of office, and none of his prime ministers were ever elected Negotiating with the PA is, literally, meaningless.
Similarly, the unelected PLO is the real power behind the PA. The PA officially reports to the PLO, and all negotiations are done by the autocratic, Fatah-dominated PLO, not the PA.
Elephant 4: The current PA government has almost no power - and no respect
Outside of Ramallah, the Abbas government has little popular support and little power. Terror groups are a very real threat to the PA in the West Bank and have been building their bases, which has now become obvious in recent years. The PA has lost large swaths of the West Bank. The PA canceled the last elections because they would have lost to Hamas.
Every peace plan and proposal includes Gaza in a Palestinian Arab state, and none of them has any provision on how to handle the fact that Gaza is a terrorist haven, in much worse shape since Israel uprooted the settlements there, controlled by Iranian-funded terrorist groups that are consistently and wholeheartedly against Israel's existence. Peace is impossible with this elephant, so it is easier to pretend it isn't there - or, for some, to position the genocidal, antisemitic desires of Hamas and Islamic Jihad as somehow a brave fight for freedom.
Elephant 2: Palestinian Arabs consistently support terrorism
In the only fair, democratic elections in the territories, the Hamas terrorists were chosen by the people. Poll after poll shows that Palestinian Arabs support terror in Israel itself. (52% still support a violent intifada in 2019.) The elections and surveys proved that the conventional wisdom was wrong - and the conventional wisdom ignores and downplays this proof that peace is impossible, and it isn't Israel's fault.
Elephant 3: The current PA government was not elected
This corollary to Elephant 2 means that the people representing "Palestine" on TV and at the UN do not represent the people. Even if they sound moderate or compromising, they have no mandate. The current PA president is well past his term of office, and none of his prime ministers were ever elected Negotiating with the PA is, literally, meaningless.
Similarly, the unelected PLO is the real power behind the PA. The PA officially reports to the PLO, and all negotiations are done by the autocratic, Fatah-dominated PLO, not the PA.
Elephant 4: The current PA government has almost no power - and no respect
Outside of Ramallah, the Abbas government has little popular support and little power. Terror groups are a very real threat to the PA in the West Bank and have been building their bases, which has now become obvious in recent years. The PA has lost large swaths of the West Bank. The PA canceled the last elections because they would have lost to Hamas.
Elephant 5: The PA is being kept alive by artificial methods
The PA budget is bloated from "payroll" of non-working workers, including terrorists who receive a salary for not working. The PA may also still be paying Gaza workers who were kicked out of their government jobs in 2006 by Hamas. The very basis of the organized Palestinian Arab workforce is a fiction being kept barely alive by external infusions of cash with no real plan to fix the problem.
Elephant 6: Fatah remains a terrorist group paid by the PA
Despite the claims that the Al Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades has dismantled, it is a joke meant to appease the wishful-thinkers. The PA might arrest Hamas members in the West Bank, but there still remains - today - terrorist groups that report to Fatah. Here's the webpage of one of them. There has been no serious move by the PA to dismantle their own terror groups, and there are lots of PA security employees who join with terror groups like Lion's Den at night.
Elephant 7: The PA's goal remains the destruction of Israel
Whether it is by "right of return" or not changing the Fatah charter or by printing map after map showing no Israel, even the most moderate Palestinian leader clings to the idea of destroying Israel, and looks upon a Palestinian Arab state as only one stage in the process. One only needs to look at the maps of "Palestine" in official PA documents and schoolbooks.
A 2011 poll that remains criminally under-reported proves that when Palestinian Arabs say they want a two-state solution, it is only a stage towards their real goal of destroying Israel.
And polls in 2019 confirm it.
Elephant 8: Jerusalem
Most Israelis want a unified Jerusalem under Israeli sovereignty. Most Palestinian Arabs refuse to accept anything less than all of ("east") Jerusalem as the capital of a Muslim state. The positions are not compatible and a compromise will not reduce the chances for violence - it will increase it.
Jerusalem, under Jewish rule, has more religious freedom than at any time in its history. That would disappear in any "peace plan." But "human rights activists" are remarkably uninterested in the rights of Jews.
Elephant 9: Israeli concessions have encouraged more terror
Elephant 9: Israeli concessions have encouraged more terror
The conventional wisdom is that if only Israel give Palestinians more of what they demand, it will help bring peace. But history shows the opposite.
Israel's far-reaching offers for peace in 2000 and 2001 had a very loud response: the second Intifada and thousands killed. Israel's withdrawal from Lebanon to UN-drawn lines resulted in Hezbollah becoming more powerful, with hundreds of thousands of rockets pointed at Israel and new provocations at the border, with one major war in 2006 and another threatened. Israel's withdrawal from Gaza did not result in peace but in the takeover of Gaza by terror groups.
Israeli concessions are regarded not as goodwill gestures that should be reciprocated but as weakness that must be taken advantage of.
And that is exactly what would happen if Israel withdraws from areas in Judea and Samaria.
Elephant 10: Palestinian Arab "unity"
No peace plan can work unless Hamas and the PA/Fatah, along with other terror groups, reach some sort of unification agreement. This is not possible in the foreseeable future. Moreover, Hamas is powerful enough that any such agreement must include a hardening of PLO positions that would be completely incompatible with the basic minimum standards for peace - renunciation of terror, recognition of Israel and acceptance of previous agreements.
Elephant 11: "Refugee camps"
The only reason there are still "refugee camps" in Gaza, the West Bank, Jordan, Syria and Lebanon are to keep Palestinians in misery - to make them pawns in photo-ops and to create new generations of terrorists. Real fighters for human rights would insist that "refugees" become full citizens of the countries they have lived in for generations - but they argue the opposite. Real human rights advocates would insist that the camps in PA and Hamas controlled territory be dismantled and normal housing built - but they don't. People who hate Israel are eager to sacrifice the lives of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians because they want to destroy Israel with the fictional "right of return." Israel will never agree so these people are left in misery, forever.
See also Elephant 16.
Elephant 12: Economics
Some 30 years after Oslo, the economy in the territories is still close to non-existent and wholly dependent on foreign aid. Not only is there no free market, there is no incentive to build one as the very mentality of Palestinian Arabs and their leaders is one of welfare rather than responsibility. All the plans to create a Palestinian Arab state do not consider Day 2 and how such a state would be able to sustain itself. The expected influx of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from Lebanon and Syria would make it even worse. It would take at least a generation to turn the poisonous attitude of entitlement around.
Elephant 13: Gaza demographics
Gazans have no room to expand as their numbers continue to grow at among the fastest rates in the world. Theoretically they could move to the West Bank but only a small percentage would. This is another Day 2 powder keg that is being ignored in the interests of a "solution" of a "Palestinian state."
Elephant 14: Palestinian Arab leaders never showed interest in independence
The West assumes that the goal is an independent Palestinian Arab state where Arabs no longer have to live under "occupation." But the actions and words of Palestinian Arab leaders have never borne that goal out; they have not worked towards building the institutions and infrastructure that would be necessary in an independent state. Their insistence on "right of return" and "Jerusalem" as issues that must be resolved before independence betray their thought processes - inconsistent with independence (neither of which require those two issues to be resolved) and consistent with a desire to destroy Israel in stages.
Elephant 15: A unilateral Palestinian Arab state would be militarized
There is no way that a new Palestinian Arab state would remain demilitarized for any length of time. The Palestinian government could invite a friendly Muslim nation to position anti-aircraft weapons within its territory; to shoot missiles at El Al planes landing a few miles from the Green Line, or to get a few thousand tanks poised to cut Israel in half.
Iran already effectively controls Lebanon, Syria and to a large extent Gaza They would use the nascent state of Palestine to position themselves on the West Bank as well. Just like the PA ran away from Gaza at the first sign of trouble, so would they lose their state to Iranian proxies and Islamic terrorists.
The PLO's will to defend themselves is not nearly as strong as their will to destroy Israel, a desire that has been inculcated in them for generations. Palestinian Arab nationalism is a fundamentally weak and externally-imposed construct. Iran is poised and anxious to take advantage of the chaos that would follow a unilaterally declared state, even if at the moment they are distracted.
But the West is ready to risk Israel for that elephant as well.
Elephant 16: The so-called "right to return"
The PA is showing no interest in integrating the Palestinian Arabs outside of the territories into their state. On the contrary; the "refugee camps" in PA controlled territory continue to grow, rather than shrink. Clearly, the PA expects the bulk of the "diaspora" to go to Israel, not a Palestinian Arab state, and decades of incitement both within and without the territories have brainwashed generations of Arabs to not accept anything less than a "return" to a land that most of them have never stepped foot in. (UNRWA has been a major promulgator of this lie.)
Elephant 17: Corruption and human rights abuses are still endemic in the PA
Despite the publicized successes, the PA remains mired in corruption, hardly a model for an independent state. The 2008 Global Integrity Report rated the West Bank as close to the bottom in its corruption ratings and more Palestinians have rated local corruption among the worst in the Arab world. It hasn't improved.
Elephant 12: Economics
Some 30 years after Oslo, the economy in the territories is still close to non-existent and wholly dependent on foreign aid. Not only is there no free market, there is no incentive to build one as the very mentality of Palestinian Arabs and their leaders is one of welfare rather than responsibility. All the plans to create a Palestinian Arab state do not consider Day 2 and how such a state would be able to sustain itself. The expected influx of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians from Lebanon and Syria would make it even worse. It would take at least a generation to turn the poisonous attitude of entitlement around.
Elephant 13: Gaza demographics
Gazans have no room to expand as their numbers continue to grow at among the fastest rates in the world. Theoretically they could move to the West Bank but only a small percentage would. This is another Day 2 powder keg that is being ignored in the interests of a "solution" of a "Palestinian state."
Elephant 14: Palestinian Arab leaders never showed interest in independence
The West assumes that the goal is an independent Palestinian Arab state where Arabs no longer have to live under "occupation." But the actions and words of Palestinian Arab leaders have never borne that goal out; they have not worked towards building the institutions and infrastructure that would be necessary in an independent state. Their insistence on "right of return" and "Jerusalem" as issues that must be resolved before independence betray their thought processes - inconsistent with independence (neither of which require those two issues to be resolved) and consistent with a desire to destroy Israel in stages.
Elephant 15: A unilateral Palestinian Arab state would be militarized
There is no way that a new Palestinian Arab state would remain demilitarized for any length of time. The Palestinian government could invite a friendly Muslim nation to position anti-aircraft weapons within its territory; to shoot missiles at El Al planes landing a few miles from the Green Line, or to get a few thousand tanks poised to cut Israel in half.
Iran already effectively controls Lebanon, Syria and to a large extent Gaza They would use the nascent state of Palestine to position themselves on the West Bank as well. Just like the PA ran away from Gaza at the first sign of trouble, so would they lose their state to Iranian proxies and Islamic terrorists.
The PLO's will to defend themselves is not nearly as strong as their will to destroy Israel, a desire that has been inculcated in them for generations. Palestinian Arab nationalism is a fundamentally weak and externally-imposed construct. Iran is poised and anxious to take advantage of the chaos that would follow a unilaterally declared state, even if at the moment they are distracted.
But the West is ready to risk Israel for that elephant as well.
Elephant 16: The so-called "right to return"
The PA is showing no interest in integrating the Palestinian Arabs outside of the territories into their state. On the contrary; the "refugee camps" in PA controlled territory continue to grow, rather than shrink. Clearly, the PA expects the bulk of the "diaspora" to go to Israel, not a Palestinian Arab state, and decades of incitement both within and without the territories have brainwashed generations of Arabs to not accept anything less than a "return" to a land that most of them have never stepped foot in. (UNRWA has been a major promulgator of this lie.)
Elephant 17: Corruption and human rights abuses are still endemic in the PA
Despite the publicized successes, the PA remains mired in corruption, hardly a model for an independent state. The 2008 Global Integrity Report rated the West Bank as close to the bottom in its corruption ratings and more Palestinians have rated local corruption among the worst in the Arab world. It hasn't improved.
The PA is a dictatorship. Mahmoud Abbas controls the PLO that the PA reports to, the judiciary, the legislative branch and the executive branch. There is no independence or checks and balances.
Women are discriminated against by law. Press freedom remains low; the justice system is opaque, and whistle-blowers are forced to go to the Israeli press to expose corruption. Prisoners are tortured. And except for rare occasions, these abuses are ignored.
Elephant 18: Palestine would be Judenrein
Statements by PA leaders make it clear that their state of Palestine would not have any Jewish citizens allowed within. Jews whose ancestors have lived in Judea and Samaria, whether for decades or for millennia, will be legally barred from living in Palestine - an extraordinary display of state antisemitism that is completely at odds with the Western standards that the nascent state of "Palestine" is pretending to live up to.
Elephant 19: The Muslim world's antipathy towards Israel
Although this is weakening, most of the Arab world and the Muslim world remains overwhelmingly against the idea of a Jewish state in the midst of supposedly Muslim lands. Iran remains in de facto control of southern Lebanon and Gaza; ordinary Jordanians and Egyptians remain among the worst antisemites in the Arab world. The Abraham Accords have been a tremendous counterweight to this, and things are better than they have been in the past, but the Arab people themselves are still overwhelmingly antisemitic and anti-Israel. The threat from radical Islam remains potent in Arab and Muslim states. No concessions would change that.
Elephant 18: Palestine would be Judenrein
Statements by PA leaders make it clear that their state of Palestine would not have any Jewish citizens allowed within. Jews whose ancestors have lived in Judea and Samaria, whether for decades or for millennia, will be legally barred from living in Palestine - an extraordinary display of state antisemitism that is completely at odds with the Western standards that the nascent state of "Palestine" is pretending to live up to.
Elephant 19: The Muslim world's antipathy towards Israel
Although this is weakening, most of the Arab world and the Muslim world remains overwhelmingly against the idea of a Jewish state in the midst of supposedly Muslim lands. Iran remains in de facto control of southern Lebanon and Gaza; ordinary Jordanians and Egyptians remain among the worst antisemites in the Arab world. The Abraham Accords have been a tremendous counterweight to this, and things are better than they have been in the past, but the Arab people themselves are still overwhelmingly antisemitic and anti-Israel. The threat from radical Islam remains potent in Arab and Muslim states. No concessions would change that.
Elephant 20: Mahmoud Abbas will die and there is no plan for the day after
Mahmoud Abbas has no successor. Polls show that if elections were held today, the new president of the PA would be a convicted terrorist now in Israeli prison. Iranian-funded error groups are poised to take over. Even if Abbas would sign a real peace agreement today, that paper would be next to worthless after he is gone.
Israel has to navigate these challenges every day. Rarely does the media mention them, instead insisting on a simplistic narrative where only Israel is responsible for peace. This pretense that Palestinians have no responsibility of their own - a fiction that Palestinian leaders go to great lengths to promulgate - is ultimately racist against Palestinians.
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