If You Don’t Let Us Keep Our Land Free Of Jews, You’re Racist

By Mahmoud Abbas, President, Palestinian National Authority (State of Palestine)

Credit: Kremlin.ru via Wikimedia Commons

Ramallah, November 15 – My predecessor Yasser Arafat and I, along with numerous prominent Palestinians, have long proclaimed we will compromise on none of the rights that other peoples enjoy, and that any attempt to curtail those rights smacks of anti-Palestinian, anti-Arab bias. Those rights include full territorial sovereignty in all of historic Palestine, and if we see fit to expel or exterminate any Jews who insist on remaining behind, that is our prerogative – efforts to prevent such an assertion of sovereignty will constitute anti-Palestinian racism, as well.

For too long, malicious outside partisans have denied the very tenet of Palestinian nationhood, thereby violating the fundamental principle underlying self-determination. We Palestinians however, have forged our nationhood nonetheless. Further, just as nations self-determine, regardless of whether external parties agree with that determination, and using whatever criteria they deem suitable for citizenship in that nation, and as increasing numbers of academic scholars insist, race determination carries the same self-determined character, along with gender and other essential elements of identity. I therefore assert the existence of, and membership therein, of the Palestinian race, and that therefore any opposition to the behavior of Palestinians must perforce be rooted in racism.

Jews, on the other hand, may not self-determine as a nation, because they are merely a religion, and Jewish attempts to claim their own nationhood – let alone the absurd contention that Palestine was previously the Jewish “homeland” – must be defeated by whatever means necessary. The reasoning follows a simple path: because Palestinians are a race, and Jews are merely a loose aggregation of different people who happen to share some elements of a belief system, no reciprocal or analogous “racism” can exist toward Jews. Go ahead and deny Jewish peoplehood; we Palestinians and our supporters do it all the time. It’s not racist, and if you call it racist, you’re a racist for denying my race’s self-determination, which can only happen by virtue of denying Jewish racehood. QED, racist.

My Hamas rivals, I must note, leave room in their rhetoric for Jews to remain in the land under Islamic dominion, at the pleasure of Islamic rulers and hosts. This would recapitulate the status quo under Islam for many centuries, but one that I and my colleagues in Fatah fear would involve repression that will only give rise to more Zionism, and we have had quite enough of that, thank you. Better to rid ourselves of racism by eliminating the Jews and calling it “justice.”

Please support our work through Patreon.