Palestine: Jew haters - like Koran burners - cannot be condoned

Dr Shaath has effectively reiterated the long held position of the Palestinian Authority’s surrogate parent - the Palestine Liberation Organization - whose Charter declares:

Claims of historical or religious ties of Jews with Palestine are incompatible with the facts of history and the true conception of what constitutes statehood. Judaism, being a religion, is not an independent nationality. Nor do Jews constitute a single nation with an identity of its own; they are citizens of the states to which they belong.

Dr Shaath’s remarks also operate as a clear rejection of a statement made by Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Israel’s Parliament in July 2010:

The first thing [in negotiations] is Palestinian recognition of the State of Israel as the homeland of the Jewish people. When we are talking about a solution of two states for two peoples, one of these peoples is the Jewish people. It is not some Israeli people, it is the Jewish people.

With negotiations having resumed between Israel and the Palestinian Authority on September 14 in Sharm El Sheikh - Prime Minister Netanyahu needs to then make it absolutely clear that the Palestinian Authority’s stance - as represented by Dr Shaath’s statement - is completely unacceptable to Israel and that Israel will immediately suspend any further negotiations with the Palestinian Authority until it unreservedly disassociates itself from Dr Shaath’s remarks.

Prime Minister Netanyahu was effusive in lauding the Palestinian Authority’s President Mahmoud Abbas as his “partner in peace” in Washington just one week ago.

How this façade can be maintained in the face of a clear statement refusing to acknowledge Israel’s continuing existence as a Jewish State is totally incomprehensible.

It is to be hoped that President Obama will be similarly outspoken and condemn Dr Shaath’s remarks perhaps by repeating the words of concern spoken by him in response to the planned burning of the Koran by Pastor Terry Jones: "It is absolutely important now for the overwhelming majority of American people to hang on to that thing that is best in us - that is our belief in religious tolerance …”

The Palestinian Authority’s position represents a serious threat to the fragile stability in the region. It makes the continuation of any further negotiations meaningless.

Was Dr Shaath’s statement endorsed by the Arab League? If not - then a strong statement from the Arab League distancing itself from those remarks should also be forthcoming.

The inability of the Arabs to accept a Jewish State in the midst of 21 Islamic Arab states has always been at the heart of resolving the Arab-Jewish conflict.

Dr Shaath’s remarks show that nothing has changed in the Arab psyche that would lead one to hope that Jew-hatred will be replaced by an appreciation that the Jewish state is here to stay.

Suspension of direct negotiations is realistically the only option available to Israel until the Palestinian Authority disavows itself of Dr Shaath’s racist and totally unacceptable remarks.

The Palestinian Authority will have signed its own death warrant if it refuses to do so.