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April 5, 2002/Nisan 23, 5762, Vol. 54, No. 29
Using children as weapons
Barry Cohen
Editor
When a human being straps an explosive device to his - or her - torso, he becomes a walking bomb. As this week's Jewish News goes to press, six human bomb attackers in six days in Israel have left 40 dead and hundreds injured.
What would possess a youth to murder innocent people and take his own life?
It takes a process of calculated indoctrination to create a human bomb, said terrorism expert Steve Emerson, speaking March 31 on MSNBC. Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat is the master indoctrinator.
The programming begins at a young age. In the West, a first-grader begins learning how to read, write and do arithmetic. In Palestinian schools, a first-grader begins learning how to read, write, do arithmetic - and become a martyr.
Proof that the Palestinian Authority uses the classroom to hone children into weapons of war appears in "Narrating Palestinian Nationalism," a report by Goetz Nordbruch issued by the Middle East Media and Research Institute. MEMRI is an independent nonprofit organization that translates Arabic media and analyzes events in the Middle East.
According to the report, from first grade on, schoolchildren are taught that part of the national Palestinian identity is historic struggle, first against the British and now against the Israelis. They are taught that every inch of pre-1967 Israel, as well as the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, is "historical Palestine." The children also are taught that Islam commands martyrdom as a means to regain lost lands.
We have seen how these lessons manifest themselves: Scores of Palestinians throw stones as children, shoot guns as teenagers and become martyrs as young adults.
Since being "isolated" in Ramallah, Arafat has claimed he wants to be a martyr as well.
"(The Israelis) decided to take me as a prisoner. ... No. I say to them (that I will be) a martyr ... but certainly one of our boys or one of our girls will wave the flag of Palestine over the walls of Jerusalem," he said in an interview with Al-Jazeera television March 31.
Arafat's statement was rather a call for Palestinian children to be martyrs. It's a role they have been taught. Their schoolbooks include references to child martyrs carrying the Palestinian flag and resisting Israeli occupation. Arafat knows that when he mentions children carrying flags to Jerusalem, they will hear the call to action.
We must not dismiss as metaphor Arafat's claims that there are thousands of martyrs standing in line.
Israel must not only destroy the Palestinian terrorist infrastructure, but also aim to transform the PA's educational system and eliminate its malevolent teachings about the glory of martyrdom - for the sake of Israel's security and to help save a generation from the twisted manipulation of a terrorist dressed in a politician's clothing.
The Israelis already know to choose life. If Israel is ever to live in peace with its neighbors, the Palestinians must make the same choice.
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