by Yori Yalon, Shlomo Cesana, Daniel Siryoti, Gideon Allon, Reuters and Israel Hayom Staff
Prime Minister's Office: "In Brussels, Abu Mazen [Abbas] showed his true face. ... Israel awaits the day when Abu Mazen stops spreading lies and dealing in incitement" • Israeli Ambassador to the U.N. Danny Danon calls Abbas a "serial rejector of peace."
Israeli officials were outraged following Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas' speech before the European Parliament Thursday, in which he accused Israel of carrying out a Palestinian mass-murder and claimed that Israeli rabbis called on their government to poison Palestinian water wells.
The latter claim, reported in Turkish and Palestinian media, appears to be an invocation of a medieval anti-Semitic libel, and has been widely debunked.
Credit: Reuters
"Only a week ago, a number of rabbis in Israel announced, and made a clear announcement, demanding that their government poison the water to kill the Palestinians," Abbas said. "Isn't that clear incitement to commit mass killings against the Palestinian people?"
Yori Yalon, Shlomo Cesana, Daniel Siryoti, Gideon Allon, Reuters and Israel Hayom Staff
"Only a week ago, a number of rabbis in Israel announced, and made a clear announcement, demanding that their government poison the water to kill the Palestinians," Abbas said. "Isn't that clear incitement to commit mass killings against the Palestinian people?"
Abbas, who received a standing ovation from EU lawmakers after his speech, gave no source for his information -- and there has been no evidence of any call by Israeli rabbis to poison Palestinian water.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office released a statement in response to the speech, saying: "In Brussels, Abu Mazen [Abbas] showed his true face. Someone who refuses to meet President [Reuven] Rivlin and Prime Minister Netanyahu for direct negotiations and spreads a blood libel in the European Parliament falsely claims that his hand is extended in peace.
"Israel awaits the day when Abu Mazen stops spreading lies and dealing in incitement. Until then, Israel will continue to defend itself against Palestinian incitement, which motivates acts of terrorism."
Reports of the alleged rabbinical edict emerged on Sunday, when the Turkish state news agency Anadolu said that a "Rabbi Shlomo Mlma, chairman of the Council of Rabbis in the West Bank settlements," had issued an advisory to allow Jewish settlers to take such action.
The same day, the Palestinian Foreign Ministry, on its website, cited what it said was a water-poisoning call from a "Rabbi Mlmad" and demanded his arrest.
Reuters and other news outlets in Israel could not locate any rabbi named Shlomo Mlma or Mlmad, and there is no listed organization called the Council of Rabbis in the West Bank.
Gulf News, in a report on Sunday, said a number of rabbis had issued the purported advisory. It attributed the allegation to Breaking the Silence, an Israeli organization of veteran soldiers critical of the military's treatment of Palestinians.
A spokesman for Breaking the Silence told Reuters the group had not provided any such information.
For Jews, allegations of water poisoning strike a bitter chord. In the 14th century, as plague swept across Europe, false accusations that Jews were responsible for the disease by deliberately poisoning wells led to massacres of Jewish communities.
Abbas also accused the international community of turning a blind eye to Israeli crimes against Palestinians. According to him, "Palestine and the Palestinian people are experiencing mass-murder on an unprecedented scale and attacks unlike anything seen or heard before by the international community,"
Earlier, Abbas rejected European Parliament President Martin Schulz's proposal to meet with Rivlin.
At the end of a successful visit in Europe during which he too addressed the EU Parliament, Rivlin told journalists in Brussels that he finds it "strange" that Abbas refused to meet with Israeli leaders, adding that direct talks are "the only way" towards a peace prospect in the Middle East.
"On a personal level, I must say that I find it strange that the President Mahmoud Abbas, my friend Abu Mazen, refuses again and again to meet with Israeli leaders and turns again and again to the support of the international community. We can talk. We can talk directly and find a way to build confidence," he said after meetings with European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker and EU foreign affairs chief Federica Mogherini.
Israeli Ambassador to the United Nations Danny Danon also responded to Abbas' refusal to meet, saying, "Abu Mazen revealed his true face as a serial rejector of peace before the entire international community. Instead of meeting with the president, or responding to the prime minister's offer to enter into direct negotiations, Abu Mazen continues to incite against Israel."
Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee Chairman MK Avi Dichter (Likud) also commented on the incident, saying that Abbas' "false character and foolish words may be able to confuse some members of the European Parliament, but they will not confuse us here in Israel."
Source: http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_article.php?id=34569
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