NEWS RELEASE
Zionist Organization of America
Jacob & Libby Goodman ZOA House, 4 East 34th Street, New York, N.Y. 10016
(212) 481-1500 Fax: (212) 481-1515 email@zoa.org www.zoa.org

July 16, 2009
Contact Morton A. Klein at: 917-974-8795 or 212-481-1500
Attn: NEWS EDITOR

ZOA: IF PA'S ABBAS CAN CLOSE AL-JAZEERA FOR "INCITEMENT," WHY DOESN'T HE
CLOSE PA MEDIA FOR ANTI-JEWISH INCITEMENT

The Zionist Organization of America (ZOA), has learnt that Palestinian
Authority (PA) president Mahmoud Abbas has shut down within the PA
Al-Jazeera, a major media that is not under his control, for "incitement"
against him and the PA. That being the case, why has not Abbas closed down
PA media, which he completely controls, for incitement against Jews and
Israel, as required by required under the signed Oslo agreements and the
2003 Roadmap peace plan?

Al-Jazeera, the most popular network of choice among Palestinians, was shut
down on Abbas' orders for committing "incitement" after it aired comments on
July 14 by senior Fatah member and PLO foreign minister Farouk Kaddoumi who
accused Abbas personally of involvement in an alleged plot to kill Yasser
Arafat. The Palestinian Information Ministry said in a statement,
"Al-Jazeera has always dedicated a wide portion of its broadcasts to
incitement against the
Palestine Liberation Organization and the Palestinian Authority" and PA
Prime Minister Salam Fayyad said yesterday that he commissioned PA Attorney
General Ahmed Al-Mughni to take the legal procedures necessary to prosecute
Al-Jazeera ('PA shuts down Al-Jazeera's West Bank offices,' Maan News
Agency, July 15, 2009).
www.maannews.net/eng/ViewDetails.aspx?ID=212107

PA media regularly glorifies terrorists and terrorism against Israel and
commits incitement to hatred and murder against Jews and Israel:

· Palestinian Authority (PA) Minister of Prisoners, Ashraf al-Ajrami
praised PA forces on PA TV for terrorism against Israelis: "Now they [Hamas]
are speaking [disparagingly] about the PA's security forces, calling them]
'Dayton Forces.' These [security] forces paid the heavy price in the second
Intifada, both as Shahids [Martyrs] and as prisoners. The greatest number of
prisoners is from the security forces sector. They are the ones who bore
arms and carried out the greatest and most important operations [terror
attacks] against the Israeli occupation - and especially against soldiers,
and some of the most famous operations [terror attacks] in the West Bank -
Ein-Arik, Wadi Al-Haramiyeh, Sorda, and others. These were carried out by
the heroes of the Palestinian security forces, who protected the homeland
and the national interest, while Hamas merely looked on for many months
before embarking [on terrorist attacks]." (Itamar Marcus and Nan Jacques
Zilberdik, 'PA boasts of past terror attacks by security forces,'
Palestinian Media Watch (PMW) Bulletin, July 7, 2009).

· PA TV broadcast an event in which Fatah bragged of committing more
terrorist acts against Israelis than Hamas. The broadcast included a mock
debate between Fatah and Hamas partisans in which the savage October 2000
murder and mutilation of two Israeli reservists by a frenzied mob of
Palestinians was celebrated and lauded as an example of national pride and
duty. (The two Israelis - Vadim Nurzhitz and Yossi Avrahami - had
unintentionally entered PA-controlled Ramallah and were arrested by PA
police before a murderous mob seized them, brutally murdered them, threw
them from the second floor police station window to a savage throng below
that proceeded to tear their bodies apart and mutilate them beyond
recognition. While the picture of a Palestinian celebrating the killing by
waving his bloody hands to the mob horrified the world, the murder remains a
source of pride for Fatah) (Maayana Miskin, 'Abbas's Fatah Brags About
Anti-Israel Terror,' Israel National News, June 26, 2009).

· PA newspaper falsely accuses Israel of medical experimentation on
Palestinians: "The method employed by the Israeli Occupation in which they
[are] instigating slow death ... doctors in Israeli prison clinics use the
prisoners as guinea pigs for clinical drug testing under the pretense of
'treatment.'" (Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, July 6, 2008).

· "Many of the male and female inmates received injections from
needles they had not seen before, and which caused their hair and facial
hair to fall out permanently ... others lost their sanity, or their mental
condition is constantly deteriorating... and some are suffering from
infertility" (Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, July 4, 2008).

· "The doctors in these prison clinics are using the prisoners as
guinea pigs for clinical testing of drugs and treatment-methods." (Al-Hayat
Al-Jadida, July 3, 2008), translations courtesy of 'Palestinian Authority
Libel: Prisoners are used for Nazi-like medical experiments,' Palestinian
Media Watch (PMW), July 9, 2008).

ZOA National President Morton A. Klein said, "It would be hilarious were it
not so serious that the PA, when it finds allegations against it aired in
the Arabic media to be 'incitement,' it is able to act immediately to shut
down the media. This is now clearly the case, even when the media outlet in
question is Al Jazeera, the most popular cable network in the PA and
throughout much of the Arab and Muslim worlds.

"Conversely, when the PA-controlled media broadcast toxic and vile
anti-Jewish and pro-terror propaganda, the PA, which is committed under
several agreements to outlaw such media, does nothing and permits it to
continue in sowing poisonous seeds of hatred throughout Palestinian society.

"For years, apologists for Abbas, the PA and the Palestinians generally have
often used the argument that the PA is too weak to enforce its own
commitments to end incitement or risk a confrontation with Palestinian
society over the issue. Yet, however, weak the PA may be, it is evidently
well up to the task of shuttering media outlets that merely air allegations
against the PA. Yet, when it comes to its own controlled media, we are
apparently expected to believe that it lacks the power to control what is
broadcast.

"The absurd and provably false apologia and indulgence for continuing
Palestinian incitement to hatred and murder against Israel and Jews must
end, both because it is a poisonous phenomenon in itself which fuels
terrorism and conflict and because it is a basic PA obligation under signed
agreements. Until this occurs, there should be no negotiations or even talk
of rewards or concessions to the PA."