At their private meeting in Bethlehem last week, US President Donald Trump blew up at Palestinian Authority President Abbas over his lies about desire for peace and incitement to violence, an Israeli TV report said, citing an unnamed American source.
“You tricked me in DC!” Trump is reported to have shouted at the Palestinian leader, whom he hosted at the White House on May 3. “You talked there about your commitment to peace, but the Israelis showed me your involvement in incitement [against Israel].”
His outburst left the Palestinians in stunned silence, Israel’s Channel 2 reported, and tensions were high for several moments before both sides were able to get the meeting back on track. No evidence of the strain was visible in the joint press conference held after the private meeting, though Trump’s otherwise warm remarks included what many interpreted as a very pointed reference to the PA’s practice of paying salaries to terrorists and their families.
“Peace can never take root in an environment where violence is tolerated, funded and even rewarded,” he declared.
At their Washington meeting earlier in the month, Abbas had insisted that his people were peaceful, claiming at a joint press conference that the Palestinians were “raising our youth, our children, our grandchildren on a culture of peace.”
But Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu quickly countered the blatant falsehood, stating in response, “I heard President Abbas yesterday say that the Palestinians teach their children peace. Unfortunately, that’s not true. They name their schools after mass murderers of Israelis and they pay terrorists.”
Indeed, there are so many instances of Palestinian leadership, including Abbas himself, urging and inciting their people to commit violent acts of terror against innocent Israelis that Abbas’s statement was almost laughable.
“Each drop of blood that was spilled in Jerusalem is pure blood as long as it’s for the sake of Allah. Every shahid (martyr) will be in heaven and every wounded person will be rewarded, by Allah’s will,” said the PA leader during the peak of the 2015 wave of terror throughout Israel.
Palestinian law also regularly allocates thousands of dollars to murderers of Israelis and their families. Children are trained in combat camps to prepare for violent confrontations with the ‘Zionist enemy’, and a report last month found that official PA textbooks for students in first to fourth grades demonize Israel and glorify ‘martyrdom’ for their cause.
Trump had apparently been briefed on Abbas’s record of incitement by the Israelis, who were able to show him a multitude of evidence of the Palestinian leader’s brazen lies.
