From the PA’s perspective it seems the truth doesn’t really matter. What matters is the narrative and the constant brainwashing of Palestinians to believe that Israelis and Jews are the root of all evil.

So too with the 1969 Al-Aqsa Mosque arson.

It doesn’t matter that the arsonist, Michael Denis Rohan, was an Australian Christian with a mental health disorder.

What matters is to tell a tale that supports the PA storyline. Therefore the PA has turned Rohan into a Jew. And not just any Jew, but “an extremist Jew” and “an extremist settler”:

Official PA TV newsreader: “Today is the 53^rd anniversary of the burning of the blessed Al-Aqsa Mosque. On this day in 1969, an extremist Jew (sic.) with Australian citizenship, a terrorist named Denis Rohan, infiltrated the Al-Aqsa Mosque and deliberately set the blessed Al-Aqsa Mosque’s eastern wing on fire.”

Official PA TV reporter: “53 years since the crime of burning the blessed Al-Aqsa Mosque in August 1969, which was committed by an extremist settler with Australian citizenship, a terrorist named Michael Denis Rohan, who deliberately set the Al-Aqsa Mosque’s eastern wing on fire.”

[Official PA TV News, Aug. 21, 2022]

Not only has the PA falsely and repeatedly accused Israel – through its framing of “a Jew” – of setting the fire, but the PA, in general, promotes the libel that the Al-Aqsa Mosque is in danger because Israel wants to destroy it in order to build “the alleged Temple.”

Palestinian Media Watch has also documented that any Jew visiting the Temple Mount is referred to as “a settler” and his visit is labeled “an attack” or “an invasion.” In more blatant examples of delegitimization, the PA attacks the mere presence of Jews at the holiest site in Judaism as a “defilement.”

Reprinted with author’s permission from Palestinian Media Watch