There is an expectation of many in the West that Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas and his cohorts, or their successors, will gain control over Gaza, and in place of Hamas. Some western leaders express the view that in the aftermath of Israel’s war against Islamic terror in Gaza a Palestinian state should be established.
However, those who would push for a two-state solution are endorsing a perilous path that would lead to a very dangerous terror state.
The PA, like Hamas, has shown over and over that its focus is on the hatred of Israel and opposing the Jewish state.
The PA makes substantial incentivizing payments to the families of terrorists who have committed murder, teaches children in their schools to hate Jews and the State of Israel, promotes anti-Jewish hate in its media, and venerates those who have committed acts of brutality against Jews. This is the way it has been for over a century since the early days of the British mandate.
In opinion polls, the populations of Gaza and of Judea and Samaria largely support acts of terror.
President Biden had described Abbas as “a man we can deal with, a partner for peace.” But Abbas is a terrorist leader who has been a lifelong adversary of Israel and the Jews. Abbas himself has frequently expressed his loathing of the Jewish State. On October 2, just five days before the October 7 atrocities, on PA TV, Abbas defended pay for slay payments made to terrorists who attempted to murder: “Our martyrs, prisoners, and wounded are the most sanctified that we have…our martyrs have the right to this money.”
As many look to Palestinian Authority leaders as voices of moderation, other leaders who harbored sinister intentions were also viewed by some as moderates, although their words and deeds clearly demonstrated their extremist and hateful views.
As Nazism rose to power in Germany in late January 1933, there were some who had the misguided hope that the clear dangers posed by Nazism could be averted by its own maniacal dictator, Adolf Hitler.
American diplomatic personnel in Germany had expressed the very ill-advised belief that Hitler would follow a path of moderation.
Following a March 10, 1933, Nazi demonstration, which was rife with anti-Jewish themes, Jews were harassed on the streets and molested in their homes. Some Jews were reportedly murdered. It was an atmosphere of trepidation and panic.
Two days later, no doubt anticipating harsh world reaction, Hitler issued a decree against terror and the use of violence.
American diplomatic personnel in Germany reacted to Hitler’s ruse, expressing some measure of relief. The American ambassador to Germany, Frederic Mosley Sackett, in response, concluded a memo to the US Secretary of State Cordell Hull, stating that the order “Should bring about a cessation of the anti-Jewish demonstrations.”
At a press conference on March 22, Secretary Hull expressed confidence, stating that the German Ambassador to the United States – Fredrich von Prittwitz und Gaffron (who would soon resign in protest of the Nazi regime) – handed him a letter reassuring that “law and order would be maintained under all circumstances.”
George Gordon, a diplomatic officer in the American Embassy in Berlin, sent a telegram message to Secretary Hull on March 23 in which he called Hitler an “element of moderation in the Nazi Party.” Gordon continued, “and I believe any way you can strengthen his hands even indirectly, he would welcome it.”
Gordon grossly mischaracterized the current state of affairs in Germany as a “struggle between the violent radical wing of the Nazi Party, represented by Goering and Goebbels, and what may now be termed the more moderate section of the party, headed by Hitler himself.”
On March 26, Hull confirmed in a telegram the ominous truth of “wide-scale physical mistreatment of Jews.” And that there was “picketing of Jewish merchandising stores and instances of professional discrimination.”
The head of the American Consulate in Berlin, George Messersmith, in a memo to Secretary Hull, on March 31, also referred to “Mr. Hitler” as a “moderate” and expressed hope that Hitler would diffuse the Nazi movement from going out of control. However, he also expressed reservations and predicted that the movement “may have a bloody climax.”
The following day, the organized single-day Nazi boycott of Jewish stores and against Jewish firms, physicians, and lawyers took place. It was obvious that the moderation that the diplomats were envisioning was not the reality. However, until 1939, as the oppression of the Nazi regime progressively intensified, the US State Department continued in various ways to avert its eyes from the nightmare that was the Hitler regime.
In the present, efforts by some in the West to create a Palestinian state continue, despite past efforts that have failed numerous times and caused waves of destructive terrorism. Pressuring Israel to pursue such aims would be tantamount to offering a reward for the atrocities of October 7.
There were expectations in Hitler to control the growing terror in Nazi Germany, but it was all folly.
The lessons of mistakes and blunders of the past should be heeded.
Portraying the PA as moderate, so that shaky and unsustainable treaties can be sought, will serve to incentivize the horrific blight of terror, and pose even greater dangers to Israel and also to Western civilization, which is also a target of Islamists.
By Larry Domnitch
