Israeli Minister Says There’s “No Such Thing” As Palestinian People

Comments from the Israeli minister have incited further conflict with the Palestinian people. This past Monday, reuters.com reported that Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich drew condemnation after he said there was so such thing as Palestinian people. Claims like “Who was the first Palestinian king? What language do the Palestinians have? Was there ever a Palestinian currency? Is there a Palestinian history or culture? Nothing. There is no such thing as a Palestinian people,” caused uproar, according to CNN. This speech from minister Smotrich happened on the same day that Israeli and Palestinian officials met for de-escalation talks. Such comments may not only compromise the meeting for de-escalation, but may also incite violence in the already conflicted relationships between the people of these countries. 

John Kirby, the US National Security Council Spokesman, opposed the comments explaining that they would not help to calm tensions in the region, saying that “it’s extremely unhelpful… trying to de-escalate the tensions and trying to find a viable two-state solution going forward… we don’t want to see any rhetoric, any action or rhetoric – quite frankly – that can stand in the way or become an obstacle to a viable two-state solution, and language like that does,” according to CNN. At the same time, the Palestinian Authority presidency labelled Smotrich’s comments as “racist” and “an attempt to falsify history… [as Palestinian people] have existed on this land forever.” NBC news reports how a spokesman for the Egyptian Foreign Ministry, Ahmed Abu Zaid, voiced that the Israeli minister’s remarks “deny the facts of history and geography … (and) undermine the efforts aimed at achieving calm between the Palestinian and Israeli sides.”

The remarks from the Israeli minister are significantly more harmful than helpful. Although the conflict between Israel and Palestine is not new, we should still find this recent event worrying as it may harm the little progress from the efforts between these countries and the others acting as intermediaries have so far. 

PBS news published a short overview of the precedents of this recent conflict, which shows that this is not the first time minister Smotrich has given hurtful and controversial statements, as he “has a history of offensive statements against the Palestinians.” In the previous month, Smotrich “called for the Palestinian town of Hawara in the West Bank to be ‘erased’ after radical Jewish settlers rampaged through the town in response to a shooting attack that killed two Israelis.” The minister did apologize but not before the international uproar. Minister Smotrich’s opinion on Palestine people is compared to those made by Golda Meir, who was the late Israeli Prime Minister, and who also caused controversy in 1969. PBS says that the next couple of weeks is the beginning of an upcoming sensitive period as large numbers of Jewish and Muslim faithful pour into Jerusalem’s Old City, as they are expected to visit a key Jerusalem holy site, known to Muslims as the Noble Sanctuary and to Jews as the Temple Mount — which for the Palestinians may be view as a provocation.

There is more that goes back to the conflict between Israel and Palestine, but as both nations try to move past these, we hope that dialogue, where both treat each other with dignity and respect, can take place.

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