(AP/Majdi Mohammed)
Abbas Zaki

Fatah official Abbas Zaki has also expressed the PA’s long-term strategy: To destroy Israel in stages so that it will “come to an end.” 

By Nan Jacques Zilberdik and Itamar Marcus, Palestinian Media Watch

One of Fatah’s top officials, Central Committee member Abbas Zaki, has called for Fatah-Hamas to unite in order to “defeat” Israel, the common “enemy”:

“If we consolidate our ranks and unify our internal front we will begin to work with an open mind, will, and strategy that are undebatable, then we will certainly defeat our enemy, which is Israel.” [Donia Al-Watan, independent Palestinian news agency, Sept. 22, 2019]

In response to US Envoy Jason Greenblatt’s statements at a UN Security Council Open Debate on the Middle East on July 23, 2019, that the West Bank is “disputed” and not “occupied” territory, Zaki called for escalation “on the ground” – implicitly calling for violence against Israelis – to “not allow the occupiers to live routine lives” but make them pay “a heavy price every day”:

“There is no avoiding an escalating policy on the ground with great momentum from the masses, which will not allow the occupiers to live routine lives. Their occupation of our land must have a heavy price, which they will pay every day.” [Al-Dustour, Jordanian news website, Sept. 8, 2019]

Zaki also repeated two dangerous libels used by the PA to incite Palestinian violence, claiming that Israel is a “desecrator of holy sites” and is planning to destroy “Palestinian existence”:

“Unity is the necessary path for those whose land is occupied and our basic enmity cannot be between us, but rather towards the occupier of the country and desecrator of holy sites, whose goal is to end the Palestinian existence in its country.” [Donia Al-Watan, Sept. 22, 2019]

‘Whoever is for Palestine Will Triumph’

Zaki appealed to the Arab states to join the defense of the holy sites, threatening that Allah will punish them with defeat if they don’t defend “Palestine.” He also repeated yet another PA libel that the two blue stripes on Israel’s flag is testimony of Israel’s aspiration to create a Greater Israel between the two rivers, the Euphrates and the Nile:

“We hope that the [Arab] brothers… will ask themselves where they stand regarding their holy sites and the fortress that is defending them from the aspirations of ‘Israel’ and its permanent motto – as is clear in its flag between the two blue stripes – ‘From the Euphrates [River] to the Nile [River]’? Where do they [the Arabs] stand regarding the connections of brotherhood, blood, and shared fate? We say in a clear voice that those who turn their back on Palestine and Jerusalem will be defeated in the end, regardless of how great their capabilities may be. Whoever is for Palestine will triumph, because they are defending Allah’s holy sites. Whoever is for Allah triumphs, while those who are against Him are defeated.”

The libel that Israel wants to destroy Palestinians might very well be just a reflection of Zaki’s and other Palestinian leaders’ own dreams to destroy Israel. In a speech at a ceremony arranged by Fatah in Hebron for students who took the matriculation exams, Zaki threatened to obliterate all of Israel. He stated that unless Israel – the “enemy” – and the US stop “their arrogance,” Palestinians will defeat all of Israel.

‘Fatah is the Path to Return’

“Fatah is the path to the return… The flag will not be dropped. If we fail, our sons, grandsons, and daughters are the ones who will wave the flag. If in a situation of peace, then [they will wave it] above Jerusalem, the towers of its mosques, and its churches. But if this enemy [Israel] and America continue with their arrogance, then [our descendants will wave it] above Jaffa, the Negev, the Galilee, the Carmel, the Triangle, etc. Land that we don’t restore – we are not worthy of it.” [Facebook page of Fatah Central Committee member Abbas Zaki, Aug. 13, 2019]

Jaffa, the Negev, the Galilee, the Carmel, the Triangle are all places in Israel within the Green Line.

Palestinian Media Watch has exposed that Zaki has a history of support for terror. He congratulated the parents of Omar Abu Laila, who murdered two Israelis in March 2019, wishing that “Allah reward them.” Abbas sent Zaki as his representative to a ceremony honoring “heroic” terrorist prisoners, where Zaki appeared on stage together with several armed masked men.

Zaki has also expressed the PA’s long-term strategy: To destroy Israel in stages so that it will “come to an end.”