How the world failed the Palestinians

ARAB countries, UNRWA, Western media, and protestors have brought misery to the Palestinian people.

One of the most poignant stories from the October 7 massacre involves a 13-year-old boy named Ariel Zohar. Ariel became a Bar Mitzvah just weeks after both his parents and his siblings were murdered by Hamas. Attending the ceremony, former Chief Rabbi Yisrael Meir Lau marked his own Bar Mitzvah several decades earlier, also as an orphan, after the Nazis murdered both his parents and his siblings.

The elderly rabbi told the young man of his own tragic past, and then added, “I had a good life and achieved much. And you too will achieve, and you too will have a good life, because you see how many good people love you.”

Rabbi Lau and Ariel Zohar represent di erent generations, one born before modern-day Israel, the other born in Israel, yet both su ered the same fate. Neither the Nazis nor Hamas murdered Jews because of a land dispute. While Rabbi Lau’s family were victims of an ideology that sought to achieve Aryan supremacy, Ariel Zohar’s family were victims of an ideology that seeks to achieve Islamist supremacy.

Indeed, from generation to generation, the location changes, the identity of the supremacists changes, yet the outcome is too often the same for the Jewish people.

But what about the Palestinian people? From generation to generation, the needle has not moved for them. Who is primarily responsible for their stagnant existence?

Constant refugees

In 1948, when several Arab nations declared war on Israel, the Arab leaders told the Arab residents, who were later rebranded as 'Palestinians', to temporarily leave, and once they “drove the Israelis into the sea”, they could return to their homes. To their surprise, the Arabs lost the war and the Arab residents who left lost their homes. The Arab residents who stayed were given Israeli citizenship.

Compounding the plight of the homeless Palestinians, the Arab countries put the refugees in camps instead of taking them into their own countries.

Compounding the plight of the homeless Palestinians, the Arab countries put the refugees in camps instead of taking them into their own countries. In fact, in 1951 Syria sought to grow its population, giving citizenship to 500,000 Egyptians. When the United Nations asked Syria to take in 80,000 Palestinian refugees, Syria refused.

Today no Arab country has o ered to take in any Gazan refugee. The overarching goal, leaving the Palestinians as refugees to evoke sympathy and undermine Israel, remains. The Arab countries failed the Palestinian people then and continue to fail them today.

Nakba

The Palestinian leaders spread propaganda to gain support, especially from their willing accomplices on the far left. One example involves the Arabic word “Nakba”, which means “catastrophe”. The Palestinian leaders describe the Palestinian refugee situation as The Nakba.

The word“Nakba”was rst used in the context of the Palestinians by a Syrian professor who lamented the fact that the Arabs brought upon themselves a great catastrophe by causing the refugee situation.

Few people, however, know the origins of the word. In fact, “Nakba”, in the context of the Palestinians, was rst used in a pamphlet written by a Syrian professor named Constantin Zureiq who lamented the fact that the Arabs brought upon themselves a great catastrophe by causing the refugee situation. The Nakba, according to him, was not the refugee situation itself, but the fact that the Arabs were responsible for their own su ering. Now strategically rebranded, the word “Nakba” is often used in antisemitic diatribes, placing the blame on Israel.

In Congress, the far left “Squad” created a Nakba resolution to malign Israel. They conveniently ignore the fact that the refugee problem was caused by

1. the Arabs’ refusal of the U.N. Partition Plan

2. the Arabs’ initiation of a war against Israel

3. the Arabs’ refusal to take in the refugees that resulted from that war.

In addition, they fail to acknowledge that throughout history there have been countless other groups of people who have been displaced, and yet had the willingness and fortitude to move forward. Only the Palestinians have stagnated.

Rejecting peace o ers

The fact that Israel has o ered peace deals with the Palestinians multiple times, but has been rejected every time, is a great failure for the Palestinian people. Ambassador Abba Eban famously said, “The Palestinians never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity.”

Prince Bandar of Saudi Arabia remarked, “It was a crime against the Palestinians, in fact against the entire region”, referring to Arafat’s rejection of the 2000 deal put together by President Bill Clinton and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak.

When Prince Bandar of Saudi Arabia remarked, “It was a crime against the Palestinians, in fact against the entire region.”, he was not referring to anything Israel did. He was speaking of Yasser Arafat’s rejection of the 2000 deal put together by two liberal leaders, President Bill Clinton and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak. The deal was so generous that Arafat’s rejection of Palestinian statehood stunned the world.

UNRWA

The United Nations Relief and Works Agency is a signi cant perpetuator of the Palestinian problem. UNRWA was initially set up as a small, short-term organisation created to provide basic humanitarian aid to the Palestinians. Today it has over 30,000 employees and an annual budget of 1.6 billion dollars. The Palestinians are the only people to have a United Nations relief agency dedicated entirely to them. In addition, the Palestinians are the only people whose descendants, in some cases several generations later, are still considered refugees. The descendants represent 98% of the current Palestinian refugees. Can someone be a refugee from a country he has never lived in or even stepped foot in?

Instead of helping the refugees move towards independence, UNRWA helps sustain their refugee status. They are complicit in the goal of keeping the Israeli/Palestinian con ict alive. In fact, one of the demands of the Palestinian leadership is “the right of return”, in which all the original refugees and their descendants return to Israel. This demand would put an end to Israel as a Jewish, democratic country.

Instead of helping the refugees move towards independence, UNRWA helps sustain their refugee status.

By supplying the Gazan population with services and supplies and eliminating the nancial responsibility for Hamas, UNRWA enables Hamas to use its own funds to build terror tunnels and manufacture rockets.

Funded primarily by the United States and the European Union, UNRWA is intrinsically linked to Hamas in terms of its goals and actions. Hamas missiles have been found in UNRWA schools and hospitals. In addition, some of the freed Israeli hostages have reported that their jailers were UNRWA teachers.

UNWRA’s schools promote antisemitism and terrorism in their textbooks and curricula. Even grammar and math problems routinely evoke the notion of killing Jews. A sample math problem might be: If there are eight Jews and you kill six of them, how many are left?

The television shows that young, impressionable Palestinian children watch certain characters whose innocent appearances belie their venomous words. These characters teach them to use violence against Jews.