One of the main center of Palestinian radicalization and terrorism in Gaza is UNWRA, the United Nations agency that deals with Palestinian refugees, stressed Member of the Knesset Sharen Haskel. ‘’October 7 didn’t happen in a vacuum,’’ she told a conference in the European Parliament.
The European Union cannot continue to finance Palestinian textbooks that indoctrinate children to become terrorists, said a member of the European Parliament who hosted this week in the parliament in Brussels a conference on ‘’how to stop radicalization in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict,’’ organized by the Israel Allies Foundation.
Christian Terhes from the European Conservatives and Reformists Group (ECR) showed textbooks used in UNRWA schools—a fifth grade and a third grade book, both containing a large picture of Dalal Mughrabi, a kidnapper and suicide bomber who killed 38 Israelis, including 13 children, in 1978, and who is still being celebrated as a martyr with dozens of schools bearing her name.
For Dutch MEP Bert-Jan Ruissen, the EU has failed in the fight against radicalization. He mentioned in particular the demonstrations in Europe supporting the October 7 Hamas massacre in Israel.
“Radicalization is a looming danger, both in the Middle East and in Europe,” he said. “It is often invisible until it suddenly comes to the surface and confronts many. The atrocities committed on Oct. 7 are a terrifying example of what radicalization can lead to.”
Leo Van Doesburg of the Israel Allies Foundation, insisted that he EU should develop a strategy to counter radicalization. ‘’Terrorists are compared with freedom fighters,’’ he deplored.
‘’There can be peace in the shadow of radicalization,’’ he said.
One of the main center of Palestinian radicalization and terrorism in Gaza is UNWRA, the United Nations agency that deals with Palestinian refugees, stressed Member of the Knesset Sharen Haskel. ‘’October 7 didn’t happen in a vacuum,’’ she said.
The ‘’United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East,’’ created in 1949 exclusively to aid Palestinian refugees, uses textbooks that glorify terrorism and incite children against Israeli Jews, both in Gaza and the West Bank, she said, adding that the EU should cut its 140 million $ funding of UNWRA;
Haskel, who is the chair of the Knesset Christian Allies Caucus, reiterated longstanding Israeli views that UNRWA was created to perpetuate the conflict by granting Palestinians refugee status seven and a half decades after the establishment of the State of Israel although no other persons in the world would qualify under the same circumstances.
“Being a Palestinian refugee has become a status, a profession, and source of income that is inherited and goes on forever,” Haskel said. Over 70% of Gaza’s population are refugees, despite being born there. “Why? Because it is profitable to be a Palestinian refugee.”
A UNWRA official is also a member of Hamas, UNWRA teachers are from Hamas,’’ she said amid a report that a UNRWA school teacher held one of the Israeli hostages in the basement of his Gaza home and that missiles and other weapons were hidden among UNRWA relief supplies.
“The most deeply engrained institution in Gaza—that allows for the indoctrination of Gaza youth, so that some of them eventually grew up to join Hamas, becoming the terrorists who raped women, beheaded men and took babies as hostages—is an international institution, which your governments fund,” Haskel said.
“If we are able to dismantle UNRWA after the war against Hamas, we stand a much better chance at peace,’’ she added.
“Europe needs to be conscious of the threat of terrorist proxies to our safety and security, commanded by our values which these proxies threaten, and committed to taking action against them,’’ said Nigel Goodrich, CEO of International Movement for Peace and Coexistence (IMPAC).
He said: “In October 2022 an Iranian proxy called Samidoun, linked to the proscribed terrorist organisation PFLP, held a rally outside this European Parliament building. Its Belgian-based leader, Mohammad Khatib, called for the destruction of the European Union, of the United States, and of Israel ‘by any means necessary’, including ‘Kalashnikovs, bullets and rockets’. He was allowed to do this by the mayors of Ixelles and Brussels, who have permitted further Samidoun rallies on our streets.”
He noted that ‘’there are many terrorist proxies operating openly in the EU. ‘’The PCPA [Popular Conference for Palestinians Abroad] and EUPAC [European Palestinian Council for Political Relations] are both led by people with demonstrable terrorism connections including Hamas,’’ he said.
“The EU must be committed to banning these terrorist proxy organisations and freezing their funding mostly from Qatar, Iran and Turkey.”
“Courageous MEPs have already raised parliamentary questions to the European Commission about these issues, and we all await their reply. Appeasement is not the answer – experience shows that to believe that the more like sheep we behave then the less like wolves they will behave is the road to oblivion,’’ he concluded.