A Palestinian activist has admitted that Palestinian children are performing acts of terrorism against Israel and are motivated by a desire for approval of their peers.
Palestinian Media Watch explained that the admission by Ayed Abu Qteish, an official with the private organization Defense for Children International-Palestine, conflicts with the organization’s public relations effort in the United States and Canada to portray Israelis as abusers of innocent Palestinian children.
PMW points out that in a recent interview on official PA TV, Abu Qteish admitted that Palestinian minors commit terror attacks, and that they do it not so much because they want to attack Israelis, but to enhance or maintain their status in Palestinian society.
Qteish stated on PA TV: “There are children who, when they were in prison, told the lawyer: ‘I want to be imprisoned.’ The first time [the child] was imprisoned, he didn’t confess, and they released him because there was no evidence to convict him in the Israeli military court. The second time, there was no evidence either. The third time, he wanted to be imprisoned so that his image won’t be hurt in the eyes of his friends, even though he is actually innocent.”
Qteish said that in several cases, Palestinian children “carried out stabbing operations because of the way the public looks at them.”
“They realized ‘the best way to clear myself of this image [of helping Israel] is to participate in resistance operations.'”
PMW said that admission is significant for several reasons.
“Firstly, in stark contrast to the claims of DCI-P in its campaign, it demonstrates that when Palestinian minors are arrested but the investigation ends without finding sufficient evidence, the suspect is released.
“Secondly, it demonstrates that, in several cases, the motivation for Palestinian children to carry out terrorist attacks is their own perception of how their own society views them and has nothing to do with Israel.
“Significantly, when discussing the motivations of Palestinian children to carry out terrorist attacks, the DCI-P representative completely ignores other real and equally relevant factors that explain their participation in terror attacks, such as: 1) the incessant Palestinian incitement to hatred and violence that is promoted in the PA media; 2) the incitement to hatred and violence that is taught to children in PA schools; 3) the PA glorification of terrorists that is an integral part of Palestinian society and even in sporting events for youth.”
The report from PMW’s Itamar Marcus and Maurice Hirsch explained that for the last decade, Defense for Children International-Palestine has “unjustifiably been accusing Israel of breaching the rights of Palestinian minors who are arrested on suspicion of committing terror attacks.”
Most recently, DCI-P launched a campaign in the U.S. and in Canada under the title “No Way to Treat a Child.” The objective is “to challenge and end Israel’s prolonged military occupation of Palestinians by exposing widespread and systematic ill-treatment of Palestinian children in the Israeli military detention system.”
But Qteish’s confession undermined the assumptions of the campaign, PMW said.
It’s far from the first time that evidence has surfaced that Palestinian children are used as combatants against Israel.
Last year, WND reported a video showed a Palestinian father shoving his 4-year-old son toward Israeli border patrol members and encouraging them to shoot him.
The images left Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu shaken “to the core of my being.” The prime minister pleaded for “every father and mother around the world” to “join me in calling for an end to this abuse of children.”
“The Palestinian leadership must stop encouraging children to kill,” he said. “They must stop encouraging Palestinian parents to call for the death of their own children,” he said. “It’s horrendous! Peace begins with respect. If parents don’t respect their own children’s lives, how will they respect the lives of their neighbors?”
The video of father:
[jwplayer oxujDdbs-pszPfxYQ]
“Shoot him! Shoot him!” the father shouts.
Israel Today described the incident: “A Palestinian father sends his toddler to throw rocks at Israeli soldiers and tells them to shoot him, saying he has another son as well. The soldiers treat the child with far more compassion than his abusive father.
“Instead, the soldier responded with kindness, and the oblivious toddler instead threw stones into the nearby field. The exchange epitomized perfectly the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Most Israelis just want peace, while far too many Palestinians have been brainwashed into believing the Jews are enemies that must be violently confronted.”
Netanyahu’s response:
[jwplayer 9B2Y2lFg-pszPfxYQ]
There have been many reports of Palestinians teaching children in homes and at summer camps how to kill Israelis.
In 2015, a Palestinian television show featured two interviewees in military fatigues who declare their aspiration in life is to “blow up the Jews.”
They’re about 6 years old.
The boys appeared on a children’s show moderated by a girl who is not much older than they are, reported the Middle East Media Research Institute, a nonprofit that spotlights reports from Middle East media.
MEMRI said the show was on Al-Aqsa TV, the official channel of Hamas, the jihadist organization that governs Gaza.
The moderator asks one of the boys, Muhammad, about his poetry.
“Who taught this poem, Muhammad?” the young moderator asks.
His mother, said Muhammad Ali Zakariya Al-Astal.
He then recites:
Oh Jerusalem, I shall redeem you with my soul and my blood.
I shall liberate you from the Jews by means of the Al-Qassam Brigades, of course.
I bring glad tidings to our prisoners: Salvation is near.
Asked what he wants to be when he grows up, Muhammad said he wants to join Al-Qassam Brigades, the so-called military wing of Hamas.
Another interviewee, identified as Zakariya, said he wants to be an engineer “so that I can blow up the Jews.”
“You want to blow up the Jews? No, we want to blow up the Zionists. You mean the occupation, right? Okay, so that is why you want to become an engineer?” the program hostess said.
Islam expert and blogger Pamela Geller commented, “Islamic Jew-hatred – it’s pure Islam.”
See the interview:
[jwplayer RmjsmCMg]
