The Palestinian Authority government is defending its practice of honoring terrorists who murder Israelis by naming public places and events in their honor.
A city square in Ramallah was recently named after Dalal Mughrabi, the lead terrorist in a murderous attack on an Israeli bus traveling on the Coastal Road during the 1970s. Mughrabi, who was killed during the incident, led a team of several other terrorists in murdering 37 Israelis after hijacking the bus in 1978.
Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu harshly condemned the action as incitement and this week protested to the United States, pointing out the continued hate and violence promoted by the PA through such events.
“It is not only missiles and rockets that endanger security and push peace further off,” Netanyahu noted. “Words can also be dangerous. Whoever sponsors and supports naming a square in Ramallah in honor of a terrorist who murdered dozens of Israelis on the Coastal Road… encourages terror,” he said in a broadcast on IDF Radio.
According to the media watchdog Palestinian Media Watch (PMW), however, PA Minister of Culture Siham Barghouti defended the practice one day later in an interview with the PA-backed Al-Ayyam newspaper.
“It is our right to preserve and maintain [the memory] of our fighters who sacrificed their lives for our sake and for the sake of the Palestinian cause,” he told the paper. “Honoring them in this way is the least we can give them, and this is our right.”
Barghouti was supported in his claim by Salim Salama, a member of the El-Bireh City Council, who added that “naming this square after Dalal Mughrabi is the commemoration of the symbolic figures of our struggle who have given their lives during the long struggle, and it is our right to commemorate them in our culture.”