A TIME TO SPEAK

A TIME TO SPEAK

Vol, III:8 (No. 32)

August 2003 - Av-Elul 5763

BENDING TWIGS

"'Tis education forms the common mind.

Just as the twig is bent, the tree's inclin'd."

- Alexander Pope

Raise up a child in the way he should go,

and when he is old he will not depart from it.

-- Proverbs 22:6

Golda Meir once remarked that the Arabs will make peace with Israel "when they love their children more than they hate us". In the decades that have since passed, the prospect of love overcoming hatred is a mirage that fades ever farther beyond the horizon.

Every phase of a child's life is exploited by the PLO to implant an obsessive hatred of Israel and Jews, and inspire a yearning to die for the sake of destroying the enemy. The child is assured that this will bring the coveted status of shahid [jihad-martyr], that each suicide-killer brings honor and glory to a proud family, and will enjoy eternal sensual bliss in paradise.

The PLO regime is raising a generation indoctrinated from infancy with the belief that the purpose and goal of life is to die for the sake of destroying Israel.

It follows, then, that this regime has no plans to live in peace with Israel on any terms, or to tolerate existence of any remnant of Israel. Else why would it be training cadet terrorists who will not even reach the age for mass homicide for another decade?

This question is not asked by politicians, diplomats, academics and journalists of assorted nationalities who scribble out principles, plans, and roadmaps based on the assumption that peace is not yet here because Israel has not yet sufficiently yielded its land, abandoned its holy places, ceded, conceded, withdrawn, dismantled, deconstructed . . . .

Teaching self-sacrifice for holy jihad is the basic curriculum in PLO schools -- including those funded and run by the United Nations -- in summer camps, in television and radio broadcasts, in the sermons of the clergy, and in the family home.

Those in the world who pay attention know that the subjects of PLO-land rejoice in and celebrate the murder of Jews, Americans, and other infidels. Less known, is the pride they take in the emotional destruction and even physical self-destruction of their own children.

The Cherie Blair Doctrine, as promulgated by the wife of Great Britain's Prime Minister, preaches that jihad-terrorists are driven by despair and hopelessness inflicted on them by their Jewish victims. But the jihadis themselves avow that they act in hope of glory, and their kin bask in that reflected glory. They yearn to achieve shahada -- martyrdom.

* * * * * * *

Family album snapshot -- baby jihadi

Toddler in basic training

Costumes by Ku Klux Kids

Itamar Marcus, Director of Palestinian Media Watch (PMA), produced an exhaustively researched and documented study in video-film and text, entitled "Ask for Death: The Indoctrination of Palestinian Children to Seek Death for Allah -- Shahada".

The gist of the report: "Ask For Death" is the message that the Palestinian Authority [PA] has been conveying to its children since the start of violence in October 2000."

From the report:

In June 2002, two articulate 11-year-old girls [named Walla and Yussra] were interviewed in the studio of official Palestinian Authority TV. Among other topics, they spoke of their personal yearning to achieve death through Shahada – Death for Allah – and of a similar desire they said exists in "every Palestinian child". It is striking that their desire for death was expressed as a personal goal, not related to the conflict with Israel.

Having been convinced that dying for Allah is preferable to life, their goal in living is not to experience a good life, but to achieve the proper death – Shahada.

The following is a selection from their remarks:

Host: You described Shahada as something beautiful. Do you think it is beautiful?

Walla: Shahada is very, very beautiful. Everyone yearns for Shahada. What could be

better than going to paradise?

Host: What is better, peace and full rights for the Palestinian people, or Shahada?

Walla: Shahada. I will achieve my rights after becoming a Shahida.

Yussra: Of course Shahada is a good thing. We don’t want this world, we want the Afterlife. We benefit not from this life, but from the Afterlife . . . The children of Palestine have accepted the concept that this is Shahada, and that death by Shahada is very good. Every Palestinian child aged, say 12, says ’Oh Lord, I would like to become a Shahid.

What has caused this compelling desire for death among these children, a desire that conflicts with the basic survival instinct of every human being? During the more than two and a half years of armed conflict, the Palestinian Authority [PA] has been making a paramount effort to convince their own children that there is no greater achievement than to die for Allah in battle, known as Shahada. This has been done via the many mediums at its disposal, including children’s TV broadcasting, the educational system, cultural programs, directives from political and religious leaders and even encouragement from within the family.

[. . . . ] public opinion polls confirm the widespread acceptance of this sentiment. These polls show 80% of Palestinian children seek death as Shahids.

Still more grave are the cases in which 14 year-olds have fulfilled this directive, writing farewell letters to their parents proudly describing their desire to be Shahids, and embarking on suicide terrorist missions hoping to die. It must be emphasized: the children’s farewell letters have included phrases identical to phrases from the propaganda films produced by the PA, such as 'Mother, don’t cry for me,' showing a direct link between the PA propaganda and the children’s drive for heroic death."

The report documents PLO-TV broadcasts that for hours a day pound out the message of shahada to children. Among the examples cited are poems and songs:

"How sweet is the fragrance of the Shahids,

How sweet is the scent of the earth,

Its thirst by the gush of blood

Flowing from the youthful body."

The PA Ministry of Education puts the message of martyrdom in its textbooks. [On the teaching of Judeophobia see A Time To Speak Issue No. 5]

The Poem of the Shahid extols yearning for death, and includes the words: 'I see my death, but I hasten my steps towards it…' [. . . . ] The illustration . . . of a dead child . . .teaches the children to identify a child as the one who is yearning [for] death."

From 8th-grade textbook:

The Moslem sacrifices himself for his belief, and wages Jihad [Holy War] for Allah. He is not swayed, for he knows that the date of his death has been predetermined and that his death as a Shahid on the field of battle is preferable to death in his bed . . .

[Comment: The PLO school textbooks are subsidized by the EU (European Union)].

A special heroine and role-model for the children is an Arab woman named Wafa, who perpetrated a jihad-bombing on a busy shopping street in Jerusalem. Her accomplishment in this act of shahada was to kill Israeli Pinhas Toketli, aged 81, who was on his way to buy paints for his art class.

An Egyptian academic dubbed her "The Joan of Arc of Palestine" and compared her to the Virgin Mary. A paean of praise, played repeatedly on PA-TV goes, sings to her:

Solo: My sister, Wafa,

My sister, Wafa,

Oh, the heartbeat of pride,

Oh, blossom who was on the Earth and is now in heaven, [, , , ,]

Choir: Allah Akbar! Oh Palestine of the Arabs

Allah Akbar, Oh Wafa!

Solo: But you chose Shahada,

In death you have brought life to our will.

But you chose Shahada,

In death you have brought life to our will.

The PMW video text reports on another children's song, "I will Even Fall as a Shahid":

This song calls upon children to attack Israel with stones . . . . It reiterates the preparedness to die [and] is sung to scenes of children throwing stones and participating in a frenzied 'war dance'.

Allah Akbar! [Allah is Great]

Oh, the young ones…

Shake the earth, raise the stones

You will not be saved, Oh Zionist,

From the volcano of my county’s stones.

You are the target of my eyes

I will even willingly fall as a Shahid!

Allah Akbar! Oh, the young ones.

The report also defines the sources of this indoctrination:

The Shahada mandate to children comes from the Palestinian political leadership. Arafat presents the actions of children who intentionally died as Shahids as model behavior. [. . . .] Asked in a TV interview what was his message to Palestinian children, he cited [a juvenile's] suicide act, saying dead Palestinian children Shahids are 'the greatest message to the world.'

The PLO media feature the happy mamas of shahids. One mother says, "The best Mother’s Day present I got this year was the death as a Shahid of [my son] Abbas." Another mother "says to the mothers of Shahids on Mother’s Day: ’A blessed day and a blessed Shahada’."

From the PMW report, citing a PLO newspaper:

After Fatma read this passage [her son’s desire for Shahada] aloud, her expression took on a look of pride and honor at her sons’ sacrifice, and her own sacrifice. Then she said: ’Praise to Allah, I gave birth to heroes’.

[One of her hero-sons murdered five Israeli teenagers to achieve his shahada.]

The PMW report includes the role of religious leaders:

Palestinian religious leaders have been a driving force, through their religion classes and their televised sermons, in calling for Palestinians to kill Jews, especially through suicide bombings. They teach that seeking death for Allah as a Shahid is every Moslem’s duty, and direct these messages to children as well. Religious rulings [Fatwas] have also established that children are obligated to participate in these activities. [. . . .]

From a sermon on PLO television: Dr. Muhammad Ibrahim Madi on 14-year-olds:

I was uplifted when a youth said: ’Oh, Sheikh, I am 14 years old. I have 4 more years and then I will blow myself up among Allah’s enemies, I will blow myself up among the Jews.’ I said to him, ’Oh young child, may Allah let you merit Shahada and let me merit Shahada...

All the weapons must be aimed at the Jews, Allah’s enemies, the cursed nation in the Koran, whom Allah describes as monkeys and pigs, [. . . . ] Nothing will deter them except the color of blood in their filthy nation… unless we blow ourselves up, willingly and as our duty, in their midst…’ May Allah make the Moslem rule over the Jew. We will blow them up in Hadera, we will blow them up in Tel-Aviv and in Netanya so that Allah will make us masters over this riff-raff. [. . . . ]

Concerning the affect of this program on the children it targets:

Palestinian polls show that 72%-80% of Palestinian children desire death as Shahids. In games and in conversation, the yearning to die for Allah is an integral component of the Palestinian child’s worldview.
[. . . .]

Palestinian children have embraced honoring Shahada from an early age, as expressed in the "Shahid Game," in which children act out a Shahid’s funeral. An interesting note on this game: the children argue who will have the honor of playing the dead child. "I am younger than you. I should be the one to die!" is the 6-year-old’s assertion. Even at this young age, they have already internalized the message that the honorable role is the Shahid. [. . . .]

Three 14-year old boys set out to attack an Israeli village, hoping to be killed. They left farewell letters which included phrases from the TV clip 'Farewell Letter' which was broadcast hundreds of times on PA TV: . . . 'Don’t cry for me. Bury me with my brothers and with the Shahids…

[Comment: The boys tried to break into an Israeli home to murder residents. They were caught and sent back to their families.]

The PMW "Findings and Conclusions":

The examples presented in this report are a representative selection, demonstrating the comprehensive campaign waged by the Palestinian Authority. If just 1% of the children attempt to fulfill their "duty" and seek Shahada through suicide terrorism, the ramifications will be cataclysmic. The targets of the future Palestinian terror wave will be Israel, and in all likelihood, other Western democracies, as well.

Today an entire generation of Palestinian children, victims of the PA’s indoctrination and propaganda, believe that their death for Allah in war is the highest achievement attainable in life. This education is an indelible stain on Palestinian society, and places the Palestinian Authority among the greatest child abusers in history.

* * * * * * *

What I Did On My Summer Vacation:

For its children's camps and sports, the PLO has especially honored a male shahid and a female shahida.

1] A boys' soccer team has been named after the jihad-bomber who blew himself up at a Passover Seder in a hotel in Netanya. He killed 30 people and injured 140. A number of the victims had survived the Holocaust and reached their 70s and 80s before they were finally robbed of their lives.

[Comment: Current PLO Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas wrote a Ph.D. thesis to prove that the Holocaust never took place. His fellow terrorist on this occasion eliminated some of the witnesses against His Excellency's thesis.]

2] A camp was named for a 17-year-old girl who blew herself up at the entrance to a Jerusalem food market. She was stopped at the entrance by security guard Haim Smadar, age 55, who sacrificed his own life to prevent her from entering the crowded market. One customer, Rachel Levy, age 17, was also killed and others were wounded.

3] The campaign has been extended to Arab children who live in and are citizens of Israel.

From a news report by Reuters, 31 July 2003:

Israel shut down an Israeli Arab summer camp Thursday after a television report showed children enrolled there shouting 'we want bombs' and supporting a Palestinian uprising for independence. ["Independence" in this context means Arab conquest of Israel.] . . . .

Israel's Channel 10 television Wednesday showed children marching to pro-Palestinian chants such as "don't want flour, don't want sardines --we want bombs' . . . .

This is all Palestine, from the [Jordan] river to the [Mediterranean] sea," camp instructor Hadi Sreyr told Channel Ten. 'We will continue the struggle to victory in liberating Palestine.'

Teen-ager Samha Wakim said Jewish Israelis should leave the country, going back to 'where they came from, Poland, Russia.' [. . . . ]

* * * * * * *

Some of this treatment of children takes place under the aegis of the United Nations, in the UNRWA schools and residential camps. Excerpts from two reports by IMRA [Independent Media Review and Analysis[:

1] In the course of routine activity in Ramallah, an IDF documentation team entered classrooms in local Palestinian schools and took photographs that illustrate the incitement against Israel taught to Palestinian school children. Such incitement is common in Palestinian educational institutions. The operation was coordinated with local authorities.

In the schools they visited-some of them under the auspices of the United Nations Relief Works Agency (UNRWA)-the team found prominently displayed posters glorifying suicide attacks, armed struggle, and leaders of the terrorist wing of Hamas. [. . . . ]

Poster hanging inside the school. The poster praises terrorist Tzi Altwil, perpetrator of a suicide attack on a passenger bus in Jerusalem early in 2001. Posters displayed in a classroom. The posters praise suicide terrorists."

10 September 2002

2] An investigative report published in the Hizbollah weekly journal exposed new evidence of children's active involvement in terrorist activity earlier this year in Jenin refugee camp. The children, after being questioned, confessed to a representative reporter of the Hizbollah weekly journal of their involvement in the manufacturing of weaponry, and of their participation in active warfare alongside armed terrorists.

[. . . ] The children, taught from a very young age to throw stones at IDF soldiers, had begun to replace stones and rocks with hand grenades and small explosive charges. 'We traded stones and rocks for hand grenades because the impact is that much stronger' explained Rami, a young child resident of Jenin. [ . . . . ]

Muatsin-age 16, used to kiss the grenades he carried on his back before throwing them upon IDF soldiers: 'Allah, make this explosive as powerful as a ball of fire so that it burns the hearts of the Jews". [ . . . . ] Parading through the streets were hundreds of children, chanting "our stance, our fight to victory or to death, for the will of Allah'."

-- 25 November 2002

* * * * * * *

Sermon by Sheikh Muhammad Saleh Al-Munajjid, report and translation by MEMRI (Middle East Media Research Institute) , 26 September 2002:

Muslims must… educate their children to Jihad. This is the greatest benefit of the situation: educating the children to Jihad and to hatred of the Jews, the Christians, and the infidels; educating the children to Jihad and to revival of the embers of Jihad in their souls. This is what is needed now . . . .

* * * * * * *

Some organizations that profess humanitarian intentions actually fund this program of corrupting the children they supposedly are helping.

The Jerusalem Center For Public Affairs examines the Palestine Children's Welfare Fund (PCWF), in its Report No. 10, 15 July 2003

[. . . . ] PCWF claims to be non-political with purely humanitarian aspirations. Its website proclaims 'all individuals are welcome to join us and provide a helping hand to the children of Palestine and to give them a hope for a bright future full of promise and opportunities.(education, health) and a bright future without violence, hatred and discrimination. The group is a non-political, non-religious enterprise whose aspirations are purely humanitarian.'

[. . . . ] The organization largely supports itself by donations from individuals and the website includes a mechanism for choosing a child for sponsoring. Some 250 individuals and organizations are listed as donors from January to June 2003 alone. Over $40,000 has been raised in just five months largely from individuals but also groups including the Westminister Presbetarian [sic] Church, Austin, Texas and the Harvard Palestine Solidarity Committee. [. . . . ]

Drawing Contest for children aged 6 to 14

The children's charity launched a drawing contest for young children between the ages of six and fourteen, entitled, Why I love Palestine. The judges rewarded, almost without exception, entries that featured fierce and violent hatred of Israel instead of addressing the actual theme of the contest. The overall winner was Bushra Ahed. The picture is unambiguously a replication of a bonfire, in the shape of a map of Israel and the Palestinian Authority, consuming the Star of David with the word "Israel" written inside the flag.

Another entry, that of Jihad Alajarmeh, depicted a Palestinian flag dropping flames on an Israeli flag and burning Israelis standing next to it. The clear objective of the contest is to support the destruction of the Jewish State, and not to focus on the issues articulated in the mission statement.

[. . . . ] There is no humanitarian justification for publishing drawings by small children depicting the burning maps of the State of Israel. The T-shirt on sale with the poem alluding to martyrdom only helps to push Palestinian children deeper into more misery. The message board includes outrageous claims that reflect the propaganda of those wishing to pursue the conflict without end.

On the basis of this evidence, one can conclude that this NGO raises its funds on false premises, and that its activities are a far cry from the purely humanitarian mission claimed in its mission statement. How can an organization talk of non-political and purely humanitarian aspirations while promoting hate and covertly excusing terrorism? [. . . . ]

* * * * * * *

In August 2003, a shopping mall was opened in the PLO-capital of Ramallah. A local 12-year-old boy greeted it as a much needed place of amusement:

"We used to play in the streets and throw stones at [Israeli] soldiers. That was our only fun."

[Comment: Children are taught to believe that Israeli soldiers are the most brutal of monsters, yet they know that throwing stones at them is a game they can play with impunity.]

END