CHILDREN AS TIME BOMBS

By Emanuel A. Winston

Middle East Analyst & Commentator

"My heartfelt conviction is to launch a Jihad war."

4 year old on Palestinian TV 'Children's Club'

"I finished practicing on the submachine gun of return. I trained my friends from among the children and the youths. We swore to take vengeful blood from our enemies for our killed and wounded."

Sung by a 7 year old girl who was then kissed by Yasir Arafat on May 19, 1997 Palestinian Broadcast Company TV.

"..know my son that Palestine is your country...that its pure soil is drenched in the blood of martyr's because it is a land of glorious battles and war: in Jerusalem, Ein Harod, Acre, Haifa, Sha'ar Hagay and the Negev. Just as this sacred soil returned to its owners [in the past] so it will return again through your courage and determination, If Allah wills."

(The map in their textbooks is also shown on the web-site on "Palestine" and is clearly in the shape of Israel.): Arabic language textbooks for 5th graders - March 1998.

"The Jihad is the religious duty of every Muslim man and woman." English lesson 5th grade textbook.'Our Arabic Language' 6th grade text: Exercise: "Use the following expressions in one sentence: 'wisdom', 'Zionist danger', 'calling for Jihad', 'tragedy'." And the follow-up question: "Why must we fight the Jews and drive them out of our land?" (1)

For some time the Arab world has used their educational curriculum to teach schoolchildren to hate and kill, in effect, molding the future. The Palestinian Ministry of Education is working with Jordan and Syria to standardize a single, unified curriculum. Syria, Iraq, Iran and even Egypt offer learning materials that reflect the biases of their government. In parallel, communications to adults through television and newspapers also taught hatred which further guarantees that the message would penetrate family thought. Their target has always been first the Jewish State (the Saturday people). They say openly:

"First the Saturday people; then the Sunday people".

Can you doubt what they mean? Now we see evidence of their murderous intent against the Christians who they call the "Crusaders" or "the Sunday people". America is especially targeted as the Great Satan. Bombing of the World Trade Center in New York, American embassies in Nairobi, Kenya and Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, the thwarted plans to blow up the UN, Lincoln and Holland tunnels and 7 train lines in Brooklyn. Most demonstrations by Palestinian Arabs include the ritual burning of flags, both the Israeli flag and the American flag. They teach hate to recover their pride in losing 6 wars of aggression to the Jews which saturates the Arab world media and prepares their mind for continuous revenge. Consider the probability of children between 4 to 10 becoming the next contingent of terrorists and suicide bombers in another 10 to 20 years. Then come the grandchildren and on to 100 years.

When Israel signed various Accords aimed at peace, usually with the signature of an American President, the Agreements, as negotiated, called for the cessation of war, terrorism and propaganda to inflame the Arab masses. For Israel, the cessation of incitement of adults and especially children was vital, IF, there was ever to be even a semblance of peace. This was particularly true in the teaching of impressionable youngsters. Such yet unformed minds are like innocent sponges who quickly grasp what their adult role models are teaching. They imprint the teachings of hatred and, as these kids grow older, that teaching is triggered at different times in their life - just like Time Bombs. A child who uses the taught mantra of killing and martyred suicide will at some point engage in exactly that. Most parents understand in practice what goes into a child's mind usually emerges in practice as they grow older.

While the recent Palestinian film clips taken in Palestinian Authority classrooms are more than shocking, it is not the first time Arafat has used children. In the 12 year civil war in Lebanon, Arafat recruited eleven year olds to become what was described by the press as RPG kids. An RPG (Rocket-Propelled Grenade) is a shoulder fired missile, used against ground vehicles. An RPG doesn't know that the finger on its trigger is just 11 years old. Their eyesight is young and clear; the weapon fires and people are killed. What a lesson for kids! Arafat's motive was that Israeli soldiers would hesitate to shoot kids. It worked. Many Israelis became victims as they did, indeed, hesitate in defending themselves against armed kids.

Children were also used as canon fodder during the Iran-Iraq War. Iranian children 7-11 years old were recruited by the Ayatollah Khoemeini to clear the mine fields for the regular army troops by running across them. They dashed happily across the fields, carrying bits of paper written with what was supposedly a passport to Muslim Warriors' Heaven. Here again, adults found they could use these empty vessels by filling them with hatred and dreams of glory in death. So, for the glory of Allah and their flight to Warriors' Heaven, the children sacrificed their lives or had limbs blown off, happy in the idea that they were pleasing their leaders.

Americans are familiar with the use of civilian hostages as "Living Shields". This was the 'modus operandi' of the Viet Cong against the West in Vietnam. In the Arab world the use of families, women, children as "Living Shields" is not new. Egypt would place anti-aircraft guns on the roofs and parking lots of hospitals and other civilian buildings. The thought was that the Israelis would not dare to hit the gun and missile emplacements on civilian buildings for fear of world condemnation was correct. Israeli pilots exposed themselves to hostile fire in order to avoid taking out those military targets.

In Lebanon during the 12 years of Arafat's control he used the heavily populated camps of Sabra and Shatilla for storage of massive amounts of explosives and weapons. With Swiss made tunnel borers he carved out miles of tunnels and loaded them with rockets, ammunition, explosives, missiles, bombs and more. When Israeli forces captured these weapons' depots, they also found extensive documentation describing Arafat's PLO's plans for a full scale invasion against Israel, with the surrounding Arab states committing their full armed forces to destroy the Jewish State of Israel. Having this munitions dump prepared in advance of the armies would offer quick re-supply and a very short supply line. It took Israel weeks and hundreds of trucks to empty the weapons' tunnels.

History is, of course, now repeating itself in Gaza and the 7 cities that Israel has abandoned to the Palestinians. The smuggling of heavy weapons, anti-tank and anti-aircraft missiles, bombs and explosives has reached epidemic proportions. The Israel Defense Forces has discovered and blown up 15 tunnels this year from Egypt into Gaza. Can you imagine what they could smuggle in with an airport and seaport without Israeli security supervision?

As in Lebanon, Arafat has once again adopted the tactic of using his own people as a "Living Shield". Arafat's uses families to live over these storage arms depots, presuming the Israelis were too soft, too human to bomb the camps, is quite clever. Compare that uncivilized, inhuman behavior to Syria when Hafez al Assad was given the "green light" by an American President to occupy Lebanon after Israel had successfully ejected Arafat's terrorists to Tunis. At that time Assad of Syria found no problem in shelling and bombing the camps, killing whole families, with no complaint by either the American Administration or any other Arab States.

Perhaps some may think that the finger on the trigger is irrelevant whether it belongs to a 20 year old or a child of seven. There is a difference, because once that blank mind is filled with the ideas of hate and killing, children became veritable Time Bombs.

Arafat and his Palestinian Authority have publicly broken all Agreements made with Israel. No one thought to include specific language like: "Thou Shalt Not Use Children as Warriors" - not that it would have made any difference. Normal civilized people believe that using children for terror would be completely forbidden - even if it wasn't written in the Oslo Agreement. The intent of Oslo was to end terror and to wean the Palestinian people away from their mind-set of a killing rage against Jews and Israelis.

Regrettably, a succession of American Presidents have deliberately adopted the familiar picture of the three monkeys: See No Evil; Hear No Evil; Speak No Evil. Even as Arafat prepares for his 100 years war (his own words), President Clinton continues to pressure Israel to surrender her defenses to Arafat. This embattled President is desperately willing to risk the existence of Israel in order to generate a foreign policy success. And our US energy corporations and a demonstrably anti-Israel State Department work for the good will of Arab nations. I must add that the Europeans along with the Russians share this attitude in their quest for unimpeded arms sales for profit.

As Arafat and other radical Arab nations teach these children and their children's children to grow into operational terrorists and soldiers for Allah, our American government turns a blind eye to this travesty., even though the Palestinian Authority's Education Ministry and TV/radio Broadcasting organizations are funded by US taxpayers' dollars - $500,000.

Professor Emanuel Tanay, a Holocaust survivor and professor of clinical psychiatry said: "This type of hatred made Nazi Germany successful. Teaching youths to hate is paramount to child abuse. If you promote hatred in children, they will grow up to be hateful adults. It is a sacred duty of parents, teachers, of all adults to cultivate flowers in their children, not the weeds in their minds." (2)

Here the words: "Save the Children" take on a new meaning. So...who will deactivate these young Time Bombs? Write your Congressmen with copies to your local newspapers and TV/radio stations. Send them this letter or write your own.

NOTES

1. Collection of quotes from IMRA, Independent Media Review & Analysis English translations by Dr. Aaron Lerner of excerpts from the programming of Palestinian Authority's Palestinian Broadcasting Corporation Television prepared by the Jerusalem-based Palestinian Media Watch under the direction of Itamar Marcus. This has been presented to the July 1, 1998 Israeli Cabinet meeting by Minister of Communications Limor Livnat.Also from video excerpts by M.A.T.C.K.H.: Mothers Against Teaching Children to Kill & Hate, Bloomfield Hills, Michigan

2. "Group rooting out seeds of hatred: Mothers organize movement of love to combat 'hate agenda' being taught to children" by Karen Talaski OAKLAND PRESS (Michigan) 7/22/98