Uploaded by palwatch on May 31, 2010
http://www.palwatch.org/main.aspx?fi=91&doc_id=1805
Sen. Arlen Specter, Itamar Marcus, Sen. Hillary Clinton, and others discuss the prospect of the future for peace and the issue of Palestinian education and indoctrination to violence and hatred in Palestinian society.
http://www.palwatch.org/main.aspx?fi=111&fld_id=111&doc_id=1025
http://palwatch.org/main.aspx?fi=111&fld_id=111&doc_id=446
Sen. Arlen Specter: “A few days ago, I had an opportunity to see some videos of young Palestinians talking about suicide bombings as an entry to Heaven and as and entry to Paradise. I found these videos to be absolutely shocking.”
[Video excerpts shown at hearing:]
Video clip: “How sweet is Shahada [death for Allah] when I embrace you my land.”
Eleven year old girl: “Shahada is a very, very beautiful thing. Everyone yearns for Shahada. What could be better than going to paradise?”
Interviewer: “What is better, peace and full rights for the Palestinian people or Shahada?”
Eleven year old girl: “Shahada.”
Sen. Arlen Specter: “This hearing has been scheduled as promptly as we could, because of our views that these films ought to be known by the people of the United States. We’re going to start with Mr. Itamar Marcus, who is the director of the Palestinian Media Watch.”
Itamar Marcus: “Not only do the Palestinians use TV as we have seen, the Palestinians use the full range of social structures, and cultural structures within Palestinian society, in order to promote these values. So for example, this summer, there was a whole summer camp infrastructure, was one that was focused as well on the suicide terrorists. Palestinian Authority has been giving active promotion to suicide bombings. When teenage children participate in the summer camp named after Ayyat Al-Achris, a 17-year-old girl who was a suicide bomber, there is no greater promotion and no greater role modeling. This is not true that these children are frustrated. Eleven year olds are talking about ‘we don’t care about this life, we only care about the afterlife.’
Just four days after the first suicide Iraqi terrorist killed four US marines, the PA renamed a square in Jenin after that suicide terrorist. Turning the terrorists into heroes is directed not just at Israelis but at Americans as well.”
Sen. Arlen Specter: “The characterization at the end about child abusers is a vast understatement. They’re civilization abusers. The children are their means to destroy civilization.”
Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton: “With the testimony and the documentary evidence concerning the glorification of suicide killers and the incitement of young people to aspire to that position, will the Palestinian Authority direct the PATV to remove any reference to martyrdom, Shahada and the glorification of suicide bombers from the television?”
Hassan Abdel Rahman: “I understand that you want to focus on this issue, but I personally, honestly, cannot separate this from the wider context.”
Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton: “On this issue, I do not understand why the Palestinian Authority cannot separate out… I’m talking about the affirmative support that the Palestinian Authority is giving in rhetoric and in propaganda and through the media to this phenomenon of suicide bombings. It seems to me that there is a very big difference from people arming themselves and having young people strap bombs on themselves, going for it, killing themselves, killing other innocent people and then being glorified.”
David Satterfield: “The video clips that we’ve just seen do indeed cultivate a climate of alienation, hostility, incitement, what has been termed a culture of death.”
James Kunder: “To see this kind of perversion of media targeted at children, knowing the powerful impact the media has on children, it’s an abomination to see this thing first hand. Frankly, sir, your hearing here today will cause us to look at all these issues more sharply in the future.”
