A recent report published by Palestinian Media Watch claims that a senior level advisor of Mahmoud Abbas blamed Israel for the October 7th massacre.
By Rachel Avraham
According to a recent report published by Palestinian Media Watch, “In a horrific example of Palestinian Authority hate speech, Mahmoud Al-Habbash—senior advisor to PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas—has announced that Israel itself was behind the Oct. 7 atrocities committed by Hamas. According to Abbas’ advisor, Israel “perhaps… prepared the conditions and led Hamas” to massacre, rape, burn alive, and kidnap Israelis, to use Hamas’ terror as a pretext to eliminate the Palestinian cause.”
Palestinian Media Watch continued, “Al-Habbash openly suggested that the Israeli government wanted Oct. 7 to happen and may have even collaborated with Hamas to make it possible. He claimed that Israel’s supposed indifference to its hostages in Gaza proves this theory, alleging that Prime Minister Netanyahu’s real goal was to use the massacre as an excuse to carry out a “pre-planned” operation to destroy Palestinian national aspirations. This is just the latest example of the PA attempting to shift blame from the murderers and rapists to the victims. But accusing Israel of planning its own worst massacre since the Holocaust is a grotesque low.”
PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas’ Advisor on Religious Affairs and Islamic Relations Mahmoud Al-Habbash recently proclaimed in a video: “”This [Israeli] government was not really interested in the [Israeli] hostages from the beginning. Perhaps the coming days will reveal this issue, which is now being talked about in Israel by the media outlets and Israeli commentators regarding the role of [Israeli Prime Minister] Netanyahu’s government in the events of Oct. 7, [2023] (i.e., Hamas’ Oct. 7 terror war on Israel).”
He continued: “Perhaps it prepared the conditions and led Hamas to this issue, because it had a plan that it wanted to carry out in the Gaza Strip using what happened on Oct. 7 as an excuse. It is now carrying out this plan, which is based on eliminating the Palestinian cause and the Palestinian existence, and perhaps it used Hamas on this issue. Hamas may have even assisted, in one way or another, this Israeli objective.”
Palestinian Media Watch has exposed other libelous statements by PA officials, claiming that Israel was responsible for the October 7th massacre. Director of PLO Commission of Prisoners’ Affairs with the rank of minister Qadura Fares claimed on PA TV in November 2023: “This whole [Israeli] outcry and this whole campaign against the Palestinian people (i.e., Israeli response against Hamas) is based on a lie, which it took Israel 24 hours to create and formulate properly. They killed their [own] civilians [on Oct. 7], and they committed all these crimes and burned the bodies (sic., refers to Hamas’ massacre on civilians), and they made up this story and said: ‘They [the Palestinians] raped, killed, and burned.’ …However, this narrative fell apart quickly… Israel’s lie is no longer tripping anyone up.”
In November 2023, the website of the PA Ministry of Foreign Affairs claimed: “According to the [Israeli] Hebrew media, the Israeli police’s initial investigation proved that Israeli helicopters bombed the Israeli civilians who participated in the nature party on Oct. 7 [2023] (sic., refers to Nov. 18, 2023 Haaretz report that one Israeli army helicopter firing at Hamas terrorists may have accidentally also hit some Israeli civilians; the [Israeli] police have denied this report). This means that Israeli military aircraft caused great destruction in the area and in some of the settlements (i.e., Israeli towns near the Gaza Strip), after the so-called ‘Hannibal Directive’ was activated, which allows the occupation police and occupation army to kill everyone (sic., the directive calls to prevent the capture of Israeli soldiers even at the risk of harming Israeli forces).
They continued, “Therefore, the ministry thinks that the conclusions of the aforementioned investigation cast doubt on the Israeli versions regarding the destruction and killing that took place in that area, especially on everything concerning the images and videos showing the destruction and the fires that broke out in many houses as a result of this bombing. The ministry demands that all media outlets, senior UN officials, and heads of state monitor this topic, show interest in the Hebrew media publications on the topic, and reexamine their positions in light of this.”
Photo from Palestinian Media Watch: https://palwatch.org/page/37154
