Two recent articles in The Wall Street Journal need to be analyzed. First is Elliot Kaufman’s on July 5 (“A New Palestinian Offer for Peace With Israel”), discussing how five Hebron sheikhs propose to leave the Palestinian Authority and join the Abraham Accords.
The second is Mahmoud Jabari’s July 9 response, “A Hebron ‘Emirate’ or a Colonial Deception?” in which the author posits that the Hebron proposal plays into Israel’s plan to divide and conquer the Palestinians of the West Bank (Judea and Samaria).
In Kaufman’s piece, the sheikhs write that they will recognize “the State of Israel as the nation state of the Jewish people.” He goes on to point out that “accepting Israel as a Jewish state goes further than the Palestinian Authority ever has and sweeps aside decades of rejectionism.”
Kaufman, however, does not explore if they will change their anti-Israel/Jewish and Western education programs, and whether religious prayers will now reflect this fundamental Islamic change of not seeking complete political and religious dominance.
The title of Jabari’s opinion piece already sets up its anti-Israel tone and biased slant. Here are some fact-check points the WSJ failed to uncover.
• Jabari points out he left Hebron as a young child because the “violence of the Second Intifada and the relentless aggression of Israeli settlers made staying impossible.” Yet he fails to point out that the intifada is an Islamic call to kill (genocide), and the “aggression” of Israelis is his misinformative explanation of the fact that the Israeli government has control over Hebron based on the Oslo Accords.
• He claims that the sheikhs’ proposal is “peace through fragmentation, replacing Palestinian national aspirations.” This isn’t new thinking— it’s the colonial playbook.” Again, he is referring to Israel as a colonial power rather than the rightful democratic government it is. While he is correct that the Palestine Liberation Organization recognized Israel’s right to exist in 1993, the rhetoric and actions of the Palestinian leaders and followers tell a different story. The two intifadas (violence against Jews) (1987-1993 and 2000-05), included many various violent and deadly terrorist attacks in many central Israeli cities (Jerusalem, Tel Aviv and Herzliya, to name a few). A tacit encouragement of violence against Jews has continued, as can be seen by the horror of two Palestinian Authority policemen murdering a 22-year-old Jewish man at a shopping center very recently (July 10, 2025). This is reinforced by the July 13 WSJ editorial, “Report shows how P.A. Security Forces lionize officers who kill Israelis.” Actions speak louder than words.
• He claims that [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s] “government allowed the provision of money to Hamas after its rise to power in Gaza to weaken the Palestinian Authority.” He doesn’t mention that the money came from Qatar to be distributed to the general population, and that after Hamas was elected by the Gazans in 2006, there was a deadly and violent routing of the P.A. and Fatah in 2007.
• Jabari states, “The settler population nearly doubled during the Oslo years.” He goes on to claim “that there are places where the Palestinian Authority is absent not because residents reject it, but because Israel restrains it. The Jabari neighborhood is located in Area C, the 60% of the West Bank where Israel prohibits P.A. security forces from operating and maintains full military (and police) control.” What he neglects to point out is that the Oslo Peace Accords set up Areas A, B and C. By definition and agreement with the Palestinian leadership, Area C (including Hebron) is where Israel maintains full control, and Area A is where the PA administers control. There is no “sleight of hand” to fragment Palestinian society, as he contends.
• He complains that the sheikhs’ commitment to “zero tolerance” for terrorism by Palestinian workers implies that Palestinian society somehow tolerates violence. And that “[M]ost Palestinians, including those who oppose the occupation most strongly, seek freedom through peaceful means.” Yet surveys by Palestinian pollsters show an overwhelming Palestinian support for the terrorist organization Hamas and its violent methods.
• He claims that “Palestinians aren’t asking for Israeli approval of our representatives. We’re asking for the right to choose them ourselves, to shape our own future, to live as a free people in our own land.” Choose your own leaders? Then why is Mahmud Abbas celebrating his 20th year as president of the P.A. after being elected to a 4-year term? Live in your own land? While the origin of “Palestine” and its people is another discussion, the question remains why have Palestinian and/or Arab leadership have turned down numerous offers for the “two-state” solution, starting with U.N. Resolution 181 in November 1947?
• According to the author, “real peace” should have the victim (Israel) end the war in Gaza rather than the inhumane, Iran-backed Hamas attackers, who have never agreed to return all hostages. Then, he continues, Israel should negotiate with the P.A. and PLO for a “credible and irreversible” path to a two-state solution based on the June 6, 1967, borders. Even though, (a) the recent history of negotiations by the P.A., PLO, Hamas, Hezbollah, and even Iran, have been based on taqiyya, an Islamic concept that allows lying to confound and defeat enemies through deception; (b) it would violate the 1994 Jordan-Israel Peace Treaty that officially gave the West Bank (Judea and Samaria) to Israel after defeating the invading Jordanians (along with the Syrians and Egyptians) in the Six-Day War of June 1967; (c) the Oslo Peace Accords already gave the P.A. territory to demonstrate its ability to govern.
• In addition, Jabari includes two more standards in his description of “real peace.” (1) The resolution of the Palestinian refugee issue. Yet one has to ask why, when compared to any other displaced people and even the U.N.’s refugee agency, only Palestinians have U.N.-sanctioned multi-generational funded refugee status? and (2) a “Marshall Plan-style investment program that builds the Palestinian economy from the ground up, including in Gaza.” This is a good idea, but what happened to the more than $40 billion already given by the United States, UNRWA and other countries to the P.A. since 1994 to build their economy and infrastructure? Instead, it was spent on the “pay to slay” salaries of terrorists, funding rockets and building massive terror tunnels.
However, the most egregious statement by Jabari, allowed to be printed by the WSJ, is: “But when you deny people legitimate political channels for their aspirations, when you close every door to dignity and self-determination, you can’t be surprised when some choose desperate measures.”
Jabari is therefore supporting, endorsing, defending and rationalizing the inhumane and barbaric violence of Oct. 7, 2023, when Hamas (and its followers) brutally murdered, burned babies, raped women and kidnapped civilians. And they gleefully filmed themselves doing it. These barbaric actions are against every international law.
And if Jabari believes “doors to dignity and self-determination” are closed, maybe he can explain why Palestinians have rejected repeated two-state solutions, while Hamas and Hezbollah have signed many ceasefires, only to start attacking Israeli civilians time and again. If any doors have been closed, the Palestinians have done it to themselves.
Jabari’s bio line in the article merely states that he “is a Geneva-based international-affairs analyst.” While he is that, it should be noted that he has done very well for himself educationally and career-wise. He serves as the global engagement lead at the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Switzerland. This is the prestigious organization that runs the famous annual Davos Meeting. Yet he still considers himself a “refugee.”
Finally, it is most disturbing and upsetting that the reputable Wall Street Journal would give Jabari a platform to foment lies and misinformation. Solving the Palestinian problem requires facing the truth, not misinformation. They should know that.
