State Department Report Finally Accuses Palestinian Authority and Terrorists of Anti-Semitism

For the first time, the Obama Administration has accused the Palestinian Authority, in addition to Palestinian terrorists and jihadist groups, of anti-Semitic attacks on Israel.

The Obama Administration’s State Department just released its 2015 Report on International Religious Freedom, but the sections on Israel and “Palestine” have been making headlines for their mention of growing anti-Semitism and violence against Israel. Even though the Obama Administration and its State Department have a long history of false equivocations and threats of betrayal for Israel, our greatest ally in the Middle East, their report still points out the growing threats from anti-Semitism.

The section on Israel notes the attacks on Israeli Jews, citing increased tensions and altercations at the Temple Mount in addition to the deaths and injuries from Hamas terrorists and other Islamic jihadists:

Militant and terrorist groups, including Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad, issued anti-Semitic statements in conjunction with 22 rocket attacks and 11 other attacks launched at Israel from the Gaza Strip. Hezbollah fired an anti-tank projectile that killed two soldiers on January 28 in the Har Dov area of northern Israel. There were also incidents involving the shooting of civilians.

The section on the West Bank and the Gaza Strip subject to the jurisdiction of Israel and the Palestinian Authority goes into further detail on increasing anti-Semitism and its deadly results.

• “Palestinian media continued to publish and broadcast anti-Semitic material.”
• “Proselytizing religious groups not recognized by the PA, such as Jehovah’s Witnesses and evangelicals, had difficulty gaining acceptance of personal status documents they issued. Anti-Semitic material continued to appear in official [Palestinian Authority (PA)] media. Hamas, a U.S. designated terrorist organization with de facto control of Gaza, enforced restrictions on Gaza’s population based on its interpretation of Islam and sharia.”
• “Militant and terrorist groups, including Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad, issued anti-Semitic statements in conjunction with 22 rocket and 11 other attacks launched from the Gaza Strip against Israel. For example, a Salafist group calling itself the Omar Brigades claimed responsibility for firing three rockets from Gaza on June 3 in a statement saying the group was continuing with its ‘jihad against the Jews, the enemies of God’ and no one would be able to deter them.”

Additionally, this section included details about anti-Christian discrimination and harassment in addition to ISIS (Islamic State) propaganda found in the region:

According to media accounts, Hamas’ de facto control of Gaza continued to prevent the PA from investigating and prosecuting Gaza-based cases of religious discrimination, including reported anti-Christian bias in private sector hiring and in police investigations of anti-Christian harassment.

Hamas-run media, continued to broadcast anti-Semitic programming encouraging violence against Jews. For example, a host on Hamas-run Al-Aqsa television in a September 4 segment applauded a child he was interviewing who said he wanted to become an engineer to “blow up Jews,” and encouraged the child to continue to “wage jihad.”

In June leaflets bearing the Da’esh (Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant) insignia were found, distributed throughout the Palestinian East Jerusalem neighborhood of Beit Hanina, threatening local Christians with death if they did not leave Jerusalem during Ramadan. Palestinian leaders, citing the overwhelming rejection of Da’esh among Palestinians in local polling, publicly stated their suspicion the leaflets were not authentic, and condemned the fliers and any threats to the Palestinian Christian community.

This is yet more evidence that the Palestinian Authority continues to enable jihadists as they terrorize Israel and Christians in the region.  This is why the United States must stand with our greatest ally in the region.

This is why we must take the BDS movement of boycotts, divestment, and sanctions seriously as another part of the global efforts to delegitimize and ultimately destroy Israel and its people.

At the ACLJ, we are not only leading the fight against the BDS movement at the U.N. and around the world, but we have recently taken on the most significant U.S. federal court case in defense of Israel’s legitimacy as a Jewish state.

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