What are Palestinian aspirations?
Although the semi-diplomatic recognition of Israel by the Palestinian Authority is sometimes claimed as signaling Palestinian acceptance of Israel, the PA refuses to accept Israel as a Jewish nation-state with a right to exist. That is, insofar as it considers Israel a state, it is not accepted as Jewish, and insofar as it is Jewish, it is not accepted as a state.
Instead, Israel is derisively dismissed as the Zionist Entity with a limited life, exactly as described in the manifesto of the PA, the Palestinian National Charter (PNC) 1968. Openly and explicitly, this advocates the destruction of Israel. Its claim of a ‘right of return’ for ‘refugees’ is a key way to collapse the state they supposedly recognize.
Promoting the elimination of Israel
Reinforced every day by the main PA newspaper, Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, (The New Life) this aim dominates PA ideology, unites its various factions, and saturates the statements of its leaders. The PA and its constituent parts live and breathe the elimination of Israel. Consequently, the PA:
- Refuses a two-state solution as an end to the conflict.
- Claims all the territory of the British Mandate for Palestine. That is, from the river-to-the-sea, inclusive of the territory currently recognized internationally as Israel.
- Its ‘pay-for-slay’ policy devotes tremendous efforts and resources to incite and richly reward those who attack and murder Israeli Jews.
- Devotes zero effort with its citizens to promote a peaceful, win-win solution.
In reality there is no Palestinian body with any political weight, with any social weight, with any economic weight, with any numerical weight, with any religious weight, or with any military weight that sees the conflict differently.
Reinforcing the Palestinian aim
- Armed with toy guns and military-style uniforms, children are ‘educated’ that the murder of Jews is a divine duty.
- Summer training camps are named after those who murder Jews.
- Sports events and teams are named after those who murder Jews.
- City squares and buildings are named after those who murder Jews.
- Eulogies glorify those who murder Jews.
- Speeches and broadcasts inciting anti-Israel and anti-Jewish violence are endemic.
Endlessly promoted in the mosques, educational system, and media, the aim of eliminating Israel is the glue that holds the different Palestinian factions together. No other sentiment is expressed except hatred of Israel and nonstop calls for its destruction. This is why the ‘West Bank’ is festooned with posters, banners, maps, wall plaques, murals, monuments, and other such material depicting only ‘Palestine.’ Signs expressing a desire for peace with Israel are entirely absent.
The Palestinian way
In sum, Palestinian-governed areas are saturated in a political-religious culture that rejects conciliation. It is impossible in these areas to openly and safely advocate and organize in favor of acceptance of a Jewish state or “normalization” with it.
All this produces a BIG problem for those who believe that a Palestinian state alongside Israel is an equitable solution to the conflict. This assumes that the conflict is essentially a land dispute between two national movements. If mutually agreed, such a characterization could indeed provide a logical, moral, and political basis for a peaceful solution.
Yet even a cursory examination of PA intentions reveals that they reject this assumption. Instead, it is claimed that Jews are not a ‘people’ but a religious body only with no entitlement to statehood (PNC 1968 article 20). In the same document, the PNC asserts the unbelievable notion that Jews have no religious or historical connection to the region.
This is why, both before and after the creation of Israel, the Arabs have consistently refused any division of territory. It is why they routinely claim the whole territory of Mandatory Palestine and refuse to accept a Jewish state on any part of it. This means that the dispute is not a ‘simple’ dispute over territory but is a dispute over the existence of Israel
The ONLY hope for peace
As long as the Palestinians aim to eradicate Israel and as long as Israel refuses to be eradicated, these aims will remain incompatible. This ensures that the conflict will continue. It is the core reason for the failure of all previous peace plans and schemes of reconciliation. As a result, until the Palestinians abandon the PNC and jettison the aim of eradicating the Jewish state, there is no possibility of any peaceful solution.
Yet the UN, EU, and those states that advocate a 2-state solution never seriously address PA aims. Nor do they demand that the most urgent and fundamental ‘reform’ of the PA is that it abandon its illegal and genocidal aim of destroying Israel. Needless to say, none of them ask or answer the following simple but crucial question:
How can a Palestinian state intent on destroying Israel possibly produce a peaceful and successful 2-state solution?
Note: a wealth of first-hand information on these issues can be found at: