Opinion: Stop supporting Palestinian terrorism

Article content

Sept. 11 came and went this week as little more than an afterthought. Addressing concerns about terrorism is no longer in vogue, especially in this country. Yet the date when 2,977 innocent women and men were killed in New York’s Twin Towers, the Pentagon and on four airliners serves as a yearly reminder of the devastating consequences of terrorism.

Thus, this week, the Abraham Global Peace Initiative (AGPI), an organization we are both involved with, drew on the lessons of 9/11 in a newly released report calling on Canada, the United States and Europe to address the ongoing problem of foreign aid financing Palestinian terrorism. AGPI’s report draws attention to the fact that the international community (including our own country) signed international protocols against financing terrorism.

On Sept. 28, 2001, the United Nations Security Council unanimously adopted Resolution 1373, requiring all UN member states to: “Prevent and suppress the financing of terrorist acts; Criminalize the wilful provision or collection, by any means, directly or indirectly, of funds … to carry out terrorist acts; (and) Refrain from providing any form of support, active or passive, to entities or persons involved in terrorist acts, including by suppressing recruitment of members of terrorist groups.”

Despite this fact, Canada recently announced $103 million over four years in taxpayer-funded aid to UNRWA. Likewise, American taxpayers are sending more than $200 million a year to the Palestinians, despite the fact that such aid is in direct violation of the Taylor Force Act, which prohibits the U.S. government from funding the Palestinian Authority so long as it maintains financial supports for terrorists.

Palestinian terror attacks across Israel are surging this year, totalling over 3,600 attacks in the first half of 2023, which left 28 Israelis dead. Despite these horrific numbers, the West is circumventing its own laws by funnelling money ostensibly for aid through UNRWA and other UN aid vehicles.

It’s been well documented that both the PA and UNRWA operate school systems and summer camps that relentlessly indoctrinate Palestinian children to hate Israelis and Jews. The schools falsely teach that Israelis are the equivalent of Nazis perpetrating a Holocaust on Palestinians, while glorifying suicide bombers as heroes of Palestinian society. The PA’s state-run newspapers and television stations convey the same messages across Palestinian society.

Foreign aid also allows the PA to maintain an extensive government-run system of pensions paid both to terrorists who successfully murder Israelis, and to the families of terrorists who died while successfully murdering Israelis. The pensions increase for each additional Israeli murdered, and sometimes exceed the salary received by Palestinian civilian employees, such as teachers. In recent years, these terrorist pension payments have cost the PA in excess of $300 million a year.

After each successful terrorist murder of Israelis, Palestinian communities across the West Bank and Gaza erupt in public celebrations, which often include dancing in the streets, lighting fireworks, firing weapons and handing out candy to children. These murder celebrations have been recorded on several occasions.

As long as the PA continues to incite and promote terrorism, including maintaining its terror reward payments, aid to the PA and UNRWA will continue to be in direct violation of domestic and international laws.

AGPI’s new report also delves into the human cost of terrorism. Its contributors include Stuart Force, a retired U.S. air force pilot whose son Taylor was murdered by a Palestinian on a boardwalk in Tel Aviv, along with UCLA Prof. Judea Pearl, whose son Daniel was beheaded by Islamic terrorists in Pakistan.

By continuing to fund the PA, Canada and America are fuelling terrorism. By supporting the PA, we are also reinforcing Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas’ disturbing level of antisemitism and Holocaust denial. Thus, we are calling on both countries to immediately suspend funding to the PA and UNRWA until such time as both institutions cease to incentivize Palestinian terrorism. It’s illegal. It’s wrong. It’s unethical. And it will never lead to peace.

National Post

Avi Benlolo is founding chairman and CEO of the Abraham Global Peace Initiative. Henry Kopel is a retired U.S. federal prosecutor and the author of “War on Hate: How to Stop Genocide, Fight Terrorism, and Defend Freedom.”