Israeli Arabs are a “demographic bomb,” says Fatah official
Official PA TV News
FatahRevolutionaryCouncilmemberMuhammadAl-Lahham:“We are in a stage of national takeoff, of impressive national awakening in which the Palestinian identity has united after years of occupation, disagreement, and dissipation, whatever you want (refers to violent Arab riots; see note below -Ed.)… We need to maintain this and continue as a national situation, as a situation with all the social forces and also the non-governmental forces, in order to remain facing this occupation and so that we will maintain the perseverance and continuation, so that this intifada will not be just a leap or an uprising. We need to build upon it in order to lean [on it] and even change the Palestinian method of struggle to raise the struggle mechanism such that it will be appropriate for the damage that the Zionist occupation is inflicting on us. [PA] President Mahmoud Abbas, when he spoke on more than one occasion about the Triangle (i.e., a concentration of Israeli-Arab towns and villages in northern Israel) and some of the occupied areas of 1948 (i.e., Israel), [he did] not [speak just] for the sake of simplicity. No, the wisdom of there being two million Palestinians in the Interior (i.e., Palestinian term for Israel), two million Palestinians who are a demographic bomb, two million bombs and rockets in the occupied Interior from among our Palestinian people. We need to preserve and strengthen their remaining. They need to be ammunition for the Palestinian national identity in order to place the picture of historical Palestine with all its geography.”
[Official PA TV News, May 29, 2021]
Fatah/Hamas Riot and Rocket War 2021 – On April 30, 2021, facing certain electoral defeat, PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas cancelled the first PA elections scheduled in 15 years. Hamas, which expected to win the elections, denounced it as a “coup.” In need of a conflict to divert public discontent, Abbas artificially generated a crisis over Jerusalem. His Fatah party called for "raising the level of confrontation,” and Abbas' spokesman told Palestinians "the battle of all battles is here.” Jerusalem Arabs responded by attacking Jews with rocks and Molotov cocktails. Hamas, Abbas' political rival, could not allow Abbas to lead the battle, so on May 10, 2021, Hamas launched rocket barrages targeting Israeli population centers including Jerusalem. Over the next 11 days, Hamas and Islamic Jihad fired over 4,300 rockets into southern and central Israel from the Gaza Strip, killing 9 Israelis and 3 foreign nationals, and wounding hundreds. In response, Israel launched Operation Guardian of the Walls to target Hamas terror leaders and terror infrastructure in the Gaza Strip. Already in mid-April, a planned eviction of some Palestinian families illegally living in Jewish-owned buildings in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood of Jerusalem had led to clashes between Palestinian residents and Israeli police. This dispute provided Palestinians with a pretext for violent rioting. Adding to the crisis, Israeli Arabs started rioting throughout Israel, especially in cities with a mixed Jewish and Arab population. Two Jews were murdered and many were wounded. According to Walla, an independent Israeli news site, 10 synagogues were wholly or partly burned down; fires were set in 112 Jewish homes and 1 Arab home mistaken for a Jewish home; 386 Jewish homes were plundered and 673 were damaged; 849 cars were set ablaze; and there were 5,018 rock-throwing attacks. In response, Jews started attacking Arabs and their properties as well, but on a much smaller scale. No mosques were burned; 13 Arab homes were damaged; 13 Arab-owned cars were burned; and there were 41 rock-throwing attacks by Jews. [Walla, May 16, 2021] The fighting between Israel and Hamas ended with a ceasefire on May 21, 2021.