Israel and the Palestinians take an increasingly large place in the media. This is true not only of Denmark, but of the rest of the world, where at least once a week we hear that one side has attacked the other. On the face of it many people probably have the impression that the one side is as bad as the other and that everything would be easier if only they would declare peace. But these no doubt well-meaning people have not understood much of the problem that the Jews in Israel have to contend with. To put it in a nutshell it could be expressed that the Israelis, in their fight against Palestinian terror, are fighting for their very survival, whilst the Palestinian terrorists are fighting Israel to exterminate. Fundamentally, in fact almost instinctively, I will always have the greater sympathy for a group which is fighting for its survival rather than a group which is fighting to annihilate others.
Naturally the situation is more complex than this. But there can be no doubt that everybody in Israel wants a permanent peace with the Palestinians. They wish to live in a two-state solution. The essential point is the sincere desire which we have witnessed at repeated negotiations. We saw this in 2000 when the Palestinians were offered more than 90% of their demands. And we saw it again recently when the Israeli government, in spite of yet another attack on the university in Jerusalem, refused to abandon the negotiations. But such good will is not to be found amongst the Palestinians. Hamas, which is in receipt of great support from the Palestinian population, has taken the honour - I stress, they call it 'honour' - for the murder of eight Jewish students. Palestinian school history books are saturated with hateful racial attacks against the Jews. Palestinian television is pure form of brain washing with the only intent being to increase hate towards the Jews; not even Mickey Mouse is too innocent to be used as propaganda material for Palestinian children.
So, on one side we have the hate for the Jews. And on the other we have the desire to be left in peace. But peace can not be achieved by shutting ones eyes and folding ones hands in prayer. Of course Israel has to protect itself by eliminating the threat of terror. This threat is not only a daily occurrence but also meets enormous support amongst the Palestinians, who hide the terrorists in their midst. Whilst the Israeli army has, albeit sometimes heavily handed I admit, had the aim of eliminating terrorists and neutralising those who murder its citizens, Palestinian terrorists have the sole intention of killing the greatest possible number of Jews. There is no specific aim of hitting military installations when Qasam rockets rain in over Israeli provincial towns. For the Palestinians it is of no consequence weather it is soldiers or civilians who die, just so long as they are Jews.
This is the precise reason that everything which represents the so called 'Palestinian cause' upsets me. In the codes of criminal procedure one deals with several varying expressions of intent, such as negligence or deliberate intent. Whilst the Israeli army has one very specific intent, to kill terrorists before they kill Israelis, the Palestinian terrorists have just the intent to kill. Soldiers and civilians. Women and children. There is no difference because they are, of course, Jews.
Other matters: First, the Israelis no longer rule over the Palestinians. The Palestinians have their own autonomous governments. And it is not correct that Israel treats their Muslim population particularly badly. Some 18-20% of the population of Israel is Muslim. They have access to health care, education and the rule of law. They even elect their own members to the Israeli Parliament. How much rule of law do the Palestinians and other Arabs offer the Jews and their victims?
Second, it is nonsense to state that the security fence is a detriment to peace. In the final analysis the fence has one extraordinary consequence. It works! It really does keep the Palestinian terrorists out and it has lead to a drastic fall in the number of people killed by suicide bombers. Of course it is problematical that a part of the fence is built on 'Palestinian' (that is to say Jordanian) land. But as soon as there is peace, if there is peace, land will be exchanged so that the distribution of it is equalised. But of course the prerequisite is that a situation is created which gives the Palestinians that which resembles a state. And quite honestly I don't think that the Palestinians want this.
Third, no Palestinian government, be it honest or corrupt, fundamental or secular, will be in the position to stop the daily (!) attacks on the Israeli civil population. These attacks are contrary to the very Law of Nations to which the Palestinians wish to belong. If a future Palestine commits daily attacks on its neighbour, it will be immediately met with extensive sanctions by the international community; it will be expelled as a terror state and ultimately met with military sanctions because the fundamental nature of the terror state is to drive the Jews into the Mediterranean Sea, just as the Palestinians were promised by the surrounding Arab states when Israel was created. The hope that Jordan, Libya, Syria and Egypt will finally put an end to the Jews and re-conquer the lost land still exists and is fundamental to the Palestinian image of itself. And it is fed daily through anti-Jewish propaganda in schools and on television.
But it is, fourth, a lie that the Jews have no claim to the territory, Israel. The country lies where it does is no injustice against the Arabs. When the Ottomans lost the First World War, it was their fate to surrender a large part of their territory to the British, who, following a legendary cabinet meeting on the 31st October 1917, published the Balfour Declaration, which made it clear that Great Britain supported the plans for a nation for world Jewry. The declaration was incorporated into the Treaty of Sèvres which ended the war and was unanimously accepted by The League of Nations, the forerunner of the United Nations. Thus in terms of international law, historically, culturally and through all other matters, the Jews have the right to occupy, to live in and to develop this area. It is the destiny of the losing party in any war to accept the conditions dictated by the winner. That is how it was when Hitler's Germany lay in ruins in 1945. That is how it was when the Muslims conquered North Africa. And of course that is how it must be when the Ottomans lost the First World War. There is nothing new in that.
There is nothing new either in the right of every people to defend itself against its enemies, which is what the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is all about. There is also nothing new in the fact that all Arab countries are saturated with hate toward the Jews. It is no coincidence that Hitler's manifest - Mein Kampf - continues to be a best seller in Muslim countries. Anyone who flips through the pages of the Qoran can see how it is a battle cry against the Jews (and all other infidels), who are to be met with jihad or dhimmitude. With extermination or suppression. This is precisely what the Jews in Israel fight against, daily.
I therefore do not believe that a two state solution will create peace. One cannot make peace with somebody who wishes to exterminate one. And I do not believe that the Palestinians themselves see any idea of becoming a real state. This would ruin the possibilities for continuing terrorism against the Jews, as well as prevent the Palestinians continuing to partake in the role of the darlings of the western media.
One is astonished that Israel is always in the firing line when the press cover the conditions in the area. One never hears a journalist declare his enthusiasm for the fact that the Jews, in less than a century, have cultivated an area of desert to become a flowering, fertile democracy whilst the areas still inhabited by the Arabs, continue to be desert. I am a great supporter of peace. I have respect for a people who create growth in even the most barren areas. I have sympathy for a people who fight for their survival.
