Folks, the Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) strongly condemned the first speech of Mahmoud Abbas, newly-elected leader of thePalestinian Authority where he said,
“We offer this victory to the soulof brother martyr Yasir Arafat and to our martyrs (suicide bombers) andto 11,000 prisoners” in Israeli jails. He also said, “the little jihad(holy war) has ended, and now the big jihad’s
beginning.”
Mr. Abbas also pledged to work for the release of all Palestinian Arabs in Israeli jails and to protect Palestinian Arabs wanted by Israel for their role in terror attacks.
The Palestinian Arab crowds responded by chanting “A Million Shahids (martyrs-suicide bombers) marching to Jerusalem.” During his campaign, Abbas was regularly greeted with chants “We will give you our blood and our soul.” ZOA President Morton A. Klein said, “We are deeply disturbed by Abbas’ statement during the campaign saying he will implement Arafat’s policies, praising terrorists as ‘heroes,’ demanding that all Palestinian Arab ‘refugees’ to be allowed to move to Israel, referringto Israel as the ‘Zionist Enemy,’ and stating he will not crack down on Palestinian terror groups. Recently, he even met with all the major terrorist leaders, proclaiming they have the same objectives.” Analysts and leaders actually claimed this was merely pre-electiontalk. Now in his first post-election speech, Abbas has made it crystal clear, his policies and platform don’t differ from Arafat’s.