Palestinians to Make Non-Compliance with Peace Agreements Official

By Ryan Jones
Israel Today

Ever since signing the so-called “Oslo” accords with Israel 15 years ago, the Palestinians have failed to fulfill even their most basic peace obligations, and in most cases have openly violated their commitments. Now the Palestinian Authority is threatening to make its non-compliance official by abrogating the entire peace process.

Palestinian official Khana Amira told the London-based pan-Arab newspaper Al Quds Al-Arabi that the Palestinian Authority will respond to Washington’s announcement that its current peace efforts have failed by canceling all security cooperation with Israel.

Amira said Yasser Abed Rabbo, top advisor to Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas, was to convene the PLO and Fatah central committees - the parties that rule the Palestinian Authority - to discuss completely abrogating the Oslo Accords and all subsequent agreements signed with Israel.

The new plan would be to unilaterally declare statehood with the backing of the international community, since, as Abed Rabbo claimed a couple of months ago, Israel is not interested in reaching a bilateral peace deal. “One party can’t remain committed while the other party has violated the agreements and even canceled them,” said Abed Rabbo at the time.

It would appear the Palestinians already have most of the backing they need for such a move, as the UN and European Union on Thursday agreed with Abbas and Abed Rabbo that Israel was to blame for the recent breakdown of peace talks.

UN and EU officials blasted Israel for being unwilling to extend a Jewish building freeze in Judea and Samaria. The truth is that Israel was ready to do so, but the Palestinians tried to expand the freeze to include Jerusalem and to not be limited to 90 days, conditions they knew would be unacceptable to Israel, thereby giving the PA the excuse it needed to stop negotiating.

Contrary to the accusations of Abbas and his crew and the picture painted by the international community, Israel has fulfilled a number of major peace commitments over the years, including:

Allowing the entry into the region and of Yasser Arafat’s PLO and even arming his troops with American weapons;
Surrendering control over 90 percent of the Palestinian Arab population to the Palestinian Authority, the government controlled by the PLO;
Fully withdrawing from the Gaza Strip, giving the Palestinian Authority an opportunity to prove its state-building ability and peaceful intentions; and
Repeatedly releasing hundreds and even thousands of jailed Palestinian terrorists in gestures of goodwill.

Meanwhile, the Palestinian Authority has refused to keep its commitments to:

Effectively and genuinely combat the anti-Israel terrorism practiced by its “citizens”;
To put an end to anti-Israel incitement and propaganda in its official media organs; and
To build the foundations for a successful and stable independent state.

In fact, the Palestinian Authority has done quite the opposite.

The terrorist infrastructure under the Palestinian Authority is far broader and more powerful than it was before 1995, and at various times even the official PA armed forces have participated in or facilitated attacks on Israelis;
Not only do Palestinian newspapers, television and mosques continue to demonize Israel and the Jews, but Palestinian Authority schools are raising a whole new generation of local Arabs to view the Jewish state as a usurper that must and will be conquered militarily; and
Despite being the recipients of far more foreign financial aid per capita than any other people group on earth, the corruption-riddled Palestinian Authority has utterly failed to create the foundations for an independent state. Any Palestinian state established today would quickly become a welfare state, wholly dependent on Israel and the international community for its existence.

With that kind of track record, it would appear there is no longer any point trying to hide the obvious. Unfortunately, considering the international community’s track record for ignoring the obvious, this latest Palestinian stunt is likely to bode ill for Israel, and not the other way around.

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