The Palestinian Authority has begun an initiative aimed at reducing anti-Fatah incitement in Hamas-affiliated mosques as allegations of serious PA-led incitement against Israel continue to surface.
The anti-incitement initiative will include a uniform formula for Friday morning sermons in all mosques throughout Judea and Samaria. PA officials hope that standardizing the sermon will prevent Hamas-affiliated preachers from using their weekly address to slam the PA and Fatah.
The PA will also make the roles of preacher and prayer leader in area mosques official positions. Officials said the move would prevent “external influences” from playing a role in the messages sent to worshippers.
The initiative does not appear to be aimed at reducing anti-Israel incitement. In previous years the PA did not take steps to fight harsh anti-Israel invective in PA mosques, and senior PA officials and preachers were among those who used mosques to spread anti-Israel and anti-Semitic messages.
PA Minister: PA was Terrorism Leader
The PA's anti-incitement program was rolled out at the same time that its own anti-Israel incitement continues to make headlines. Over the weekend, PA Minister of Prisoners Affairs Issa Qaraqe praised Christian terrorists, including one convicted of murdering two Israelis; this week the Palestinian Media Watch (PMW) organization revealed that senior PA clerics have been preaching that Jews are evil and Jerusalem has no Jewish history.
Translators from PMW found that former PA official Ashraf el-Ajrami gave a television interview praising the PA's involvement in terrorist attacks on Israel in recent years. PA forces, including its police, carried out “the biggest and most important operations” during the years of terrorist violence that erupted in 2000, Ajrami said.
Ajrami's defense of the PA as “the backbone” of anti-Israel terror was a response to Hamas criticism of PA armed forces. Hamas derided the troops as “Dayton's troops,” a reference to the advanced training the security forces receive from American general Keith Dayton.
The high level of terrorist activity among PA forces is clear from the high percent of “martyrs” and prisoners who are affiliated with the Fatah-led PA, Ajrami said.
He gave several examples of attacks carried out by those serving in PA special forces at the time. One was the 2002 attack at the Ein Arik checkpoint, in which six soldiers were killed and others wounded; the two terrorists responsible were PA policemen.
The former PA minister also stated that PA troops were responsible in a 2002 shooting attack near Ofra in which 10 soldiers and civilians were murdered. Another attack in the same area, in which a mother of five was murdered while driving home, was carried out by terrorists using weapons provided by PA troops.
PA troops were carrying out attacks on Israeli soldiers and civilians “while for months Hamas stood by the side and watched before beginning to take action,” Ajrami concluded.
Ajrami's message of pride in the terrorist attacks carried out by PA troops sends a clear message to PA Arabs, said PMW's Itamar Marcus and Nan Jacques Zilberdik: “Don't disregard the PA security forces, since they are likely to be the backbone of a future war against Israel.”