Palestinian Media Watch Bulletin, May 25, 2006.

International leaders anxiously look to Mahmoud Abbas as a potential peace
partner, largely because of his moderate statements in English. However, his
Arabic statements continue to show admiration for even the most depraved
terrorists. Likewise, Abbas rejects terror for tactical reasons only — not because
it is immoral.

During a television interview this week, Abbas twice referred to those terrorists
serving “tens of life sentences” in Israeli jails as “our heroes.” The terrorists
who are serving “tens of life sentences” are those arch terrorists who have
personally killed tens of Israelis,, and are sentenced to one life sentence for
each murder. These are the people whom Mahmoud Abbas calls “our heroes.”

In the statement on PA TV about the jailed terrorists’ recent attempts to bring
peace between the Fatah and Hamas, Mahmoud Abbas expressed his
satisfaction with the: “initiative of our brothers, our jailed heroes, who have
presented a similar initiative [for dialogue] . . . the initiative proves that these
heroes, who are sentenced to tens of life sentences, feel too that the homeland
is in danger…” [PA TV May 23, 2006]

As we have reported in the past, even in his so-called “condemnations” of
terror attacks, Abbas has always been careful in Arabic not to condemn terror
because it is evil or immoral. He has criticized suicide terror only because it
hurts the Palestinian cause, as he did after the December 2005 suicide attack
that killed five in Netanya.

Israeli and Western leaders are so eager to find a viable partner for peace that
they often mistake Palestinian Authority leaders’ “lip service” in English as
statements of truly peaceful intentions. But as PMW has reported for the past
decade, the only way to understand these leaders’ real opinions is to pay
attention to what they are telling their own people in Arabic. These are the only
messages that count.