It was supposed to be a harbinger of peace, but it never worked out that way. The entire thing was an Arafat ruse. The Palestinians killed the Oslo Accords before the ink on Yasser Arafat’s signature was dry.
That famous handshake. It happened twenty-seven years ago on September 13, 1993. When I close my eyes, I can still see supposedly reformed terrorist Arafat, grasping the palm of Prime Minister Rabin. I remember saying the Shehecheyanu prayer, thanking God for keeping me alive and letting me see this glorious day. The whole world was full of optimism. Even Clinton’s Secretary of State, the usually dour Warren Christopher, stepped up to the microphone to gloat, saying that the impossible was now possible. He was wrong.
On that day, Israel supporters let themselves believe that 45 years of attacks against Israel were over; peace was finally within arm’s reach. Once the agreement with the Palestinians was finalized, there was no excuse remaining; the other Arab nations had to fall into line. Ironically, thanks to a different U.S. President, the Arab countries have begun to “fall in line” and make peace with Israel twenty-seven years later despite the Palestinian leadership’s refusal to follow Oslo or to accept anything less than the destruction of the Jewish State of Israel.
As part of Oslo, the two groups signed “Letters of Mutual Recognition”—the Israeli government recognized the PLO as the legitimate representative of the Palestinian people. The letters also required that the PLO’s Palestinian National Charter (PNC) was to be amended to recognize Israel’s right to exist and renouncing violence. But this was never done, and thus the original Charter stands to this day.
Twenty-seven years after Oslo, Article 19 of the PNC still states, “the establishment of Israel is fundamentally null and void.” Article 20 continues to deny the existence of the Jewish people as a nation and any ties that it might have to the Land of Israel. Which is a continued rejection of the original partition plan. UN Resolution #181 calls for the creation of Jewish and Arab States.
Despite Oslo, the PNC’s Article 22 still asserts that Zionism is “fascist” and “the liberation of Palestine will destroy the Zionist and imperialist presence and will contribute to the establishment of peace in the Middle East.” And the 9th Article still calls for violence, “Armed struggle is the only way to liberate Palestine.”
The Oslo accords called for the Palestinians in Judea, Samaria, and Gaza to rule themselves. Thus after it was signed, the Egyptian-born terrorist Yasser Arafat was allowed to travel through those territories to organize a government and lead them to peace.
According to the Jerusalem Post (November 18, 1994), from the very beginning, Arafat assured Arab audiences that his agreements with Israel are part of the PLO’s phased destruction of Israel plan adopted in 1974. In that plan, the PLO will destroy Israel step by step: first, by taking control of the disputed territories, then conquering the rest of Israel. On the very day he signed the Oslo accords, Arafat went on Jordanian television (which at the time was the only TV seen in the Judea and Samaria) and explained the accords as a phase in the implementation of the 1974 plan.
Oslo didn’t stop terrorism. In the two years between the signing of Oslo and the assassination of Prime Minister Rabin, ten Palestinian terrorist attacks were killing 75 Israelis and wounding another 242. The crazed zealot who killed the Prime Minister did so because he hated the Oslo Accords, but by killing Rabin, he may have saved Oslo.
In 2010 Rabin’s daughter Dalia was interviewed by the Seven Days magazine supplement of the Israeli newspaper Yediot Ahronot and revealed:
“Many people who were close to father told me that on the eve of the murder he considered stopping the Oslo process because of the terror that was running rampant in the streets and that Arafat wasn’t delivering the goods.
Father, after all, wasn’t a blind man running forward without thought. I don’t rule out the possibility that he considered also doing a reverse on our side.
After all, he was someone for whom the security of the state was sacrosanct.”
According to figures from the Jewish Virtual Library, in the twenty-seven year since Oslo, terrorism never stopped. From the signing of the Oslo Accords (Sept. 1993) until September 2000 – nearly 300 innocents were killed in attacks. During the second intifada (Sept. 2000-December 2005), 1,100 were murdered. And since December 2005, Palestinian terrorist attacks have claimed another 250 Israeli lives.
Twice since that signing ceremony in 1993, Israel offered the Palestinians peace, giving them almost everything they wanted, and each time the Palestinians refused. In 2000 Arafat walked away and began the second intifada. President Clinton blamed Arafat after the failure of the talks, stating, “I regret that in 2000 Arafat missed the opportunity to bring that nation into being and pray for the day when the dreams of the Palestinian people for a state and a better life will be realized in a just and lasting peace.”
The Palestinians are still using their foreign aid to pay blood money to terrorists and their families. They continue to honor terrorists as national heroes naming buildings and stadiums with their names. In 2016, they even celebrated the 11,000th Israeli killed. Despite the Oslo accords, the Palestinian leadership never stopped calling for violence against innocent Israelis (sometimes they call it “Days Of Rage”). They still deny the Jewish connection to the holy land and even deny Jewish, Christian, and Muslim theology by saying there were never Jewish Temples on top of the Temple Mount.
“The Official 1925 Supreme Moslem Council (Wakf) Guide Book To Al-Ḥaram Al-Sarif” recognized the presence of the Jewish Temples atop the Mount. Paragraph two, on page four, says, “It’s [the Temple Mount] identity with the site of Solomon’s Temple is beyond dispute.”
Now. 95 years later, they are saying the Wakf was wrong.
In 2018 after President Trump recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, who was in the 13th year of his four-year-term, gave a two-hour long address where he called President Trump’s peace plan “a slap in the face” that “we will slap back.” Speaking of Trump, Abbas also said, “May your house be destroyed.” I am sure that President Trump was not intimidated by the threat.
Abbas added that “today is the day that the Oslo Accords end. Israel killed them. We are an authority without any authority and an occupation without any cost. Trump threatened to cut funding to the authority because negotiations have failed. When the hell did negotiations start?”
Sorry Mr. Supposedly Reformed Terrorist, but when did the Oslo Accords start? When did the PLO change its Charter to renounce violence and recognize Israel’s right to exist? When Did the Palestinian leadership stop inciting its people to kill Israelis? When did they stop claiming the Jews had no connection to the land? When did they stop walking away from peace proposals favorable to their positions?
Abbas’ stubbornness hurt his own people. Two years after his threatening words, Trump announced the creation of an outline of a peace deal. Abbas’ government refused to participate in its development. The Arab States were already losing patience with the Palestinians because they refused to make any compromise. With his refusal to talk peace, their impatience grew. Thanks to mediation by President Trump, in the past month, two Arab countries that before would not speak to Israel before it made peace with the Palestinians changed their minds. So far, it’s the UAE and Bahrain, others are expected to follow quickly. You will know the Arab state’s patience is totally gone when the Saudis join in on the fun.
The economies of Israel, the UAE, and Bahrain have already begun to work together. Because nothing makes peace like the opportunity to make money. In the twenty-seven years since Oslo, the Palestinian Authority, never accepted Israel as an economic partner. And in many cases, when they were given foreign aid, that money ended up in the private bank accounts of the Palestinian leaders.
The Oslo accords never really existed except on paper. The Oslo accords were a farce that made the words of Ze’ ev Jabotinsky ring more accurate than ever:
“It is incredible what political simpletons Jews are. They shut their eyes to one of the most elementary rules of life, that you must not ‘meet halfway’ those who do not want to meet you.’
