There is an Arab proverb about a village idiot who seeks attention by causing provocations. It goes: "Be contrary and you'll be heard." MK Hanin Zoabi's despicable comparison between Israel and the Nazi regime in the context of the Palestinians, as the world marked the 77th anniversary of Kristallnacht, falls under that description. It is a defilement. With her remarks, Zoabi shoved her unclean hands directly into the Jews' deepest wounds. But it is because we ourselves have overused this sacred topic. Knowing full well what she was doing, the remarks she made were like an exhibitionist exposing himself in front of innocent children. The Arab story says: "If you offer respect to a noble man, you earn respect, but if you offer respect to someone despicable, he throws it back in your face." For Zoabi, the terrible crime committed against the Jews on Kristallnacht apparently evokes secret wishes and suppressed associations in the context of the Palestinians' true intentions for the Jews. These intentions are evident in the Prophet Muhammad's massacre of the 700 Jews of Banu Qurayza, the grand mufti of Jerusalem's plotting with Hitler to exterminate Jews, and Zoabi's own desire to abide by the Hamas charter (Clause 7 -- murder of Jews) when she took sail to Gaza aboard the blockade-busting ship, the Mavi Marmara. Zoabi's tortured soul suffered many trials before making this speech at a conference in the Netherlands. Even before her bold trip to Gaza aboard the Mavi Marmara, she met with the arch murderer Libyan dictator Moammar Gadhafi. No doubt that intimate, personal meeting opened her eyes and endowed this spiritual, humanist woman with unique insight into the crimes of Kristallnacht. Associations are a key element in every person's perspective. The word Kristallnacht comes from the crystal-like shards of glass everywhere from looted Jewish shops, synagogues and community buildings. Dozens of Jews were murdered and tens of thousands were deported from Germany. It's possible that Zoabi's association as she spoke in the Netherlands about Kristallnacht was Palestinian terrorists breaking glass bottles and using knives to stab and cut the carotid arteries of Jewish passersby. It's likely that her thoughts wandered to the way in which the killers fill glass bottles with gasoline to burn Jews as they were burned in Germany. But Zoabi is different from the Germans, who remained silent in the face of the contemptible use of terrorism. She calls on the Palestinians to carry out more Kristallnachts against Jews "as a legitimate struggle against occupation." Zoabi is tormented by self-criticism and political awareness. She is conscious of the murderousness of her Arab, Palestinian and Muslim brothers, of honor killings, of the regional terrorism and killing. It is her Muslim Arab brothers who are blowing up and setting fire to churches and mosques in Egypt, Syria and Iraq. It is her brothers who are blowing up statues of Buddha in Afghanistan. It is her brothers who blew up the ancient city of Palmyra. Her brothers are the ones who are slaughtering the Copts in Egypt. Her Palestinian brothers are the ones who vandalized the Church of the Nativity and relieved themselves on its carpets during the intifada. Her Palestinian brothers are the ones who raped Christian girls in Bethlehem and Beit Jala and robbed their homes. Her Palestinian brothers are the ones who broke the windows at Joseph's Tomb in Nablus and set it aflame. They're the ones who shot and killed senior Fatah officials in Gaza and killed others by throwing them off rooftops, and now they're killing Jews who walk past them on the street. Zoabi is keeping quiet about this Kristallnacht. Unlike Zoabi and her Knesset comrades, Israelis aren't staying quiet. They cry out over every lynch and condemn every disgusting murder. Israelis don't hate Palestinians. They seek, to the point of obsequiousness, contact with their villages, restaurants and businesses. But if a Jew happens to enter a Palestinian village or refugee camp by mistake, chances are he won't make it out in one piece. The Kristallnacht that Zoabi is ignoring with thunderous silence expresses the variety of forms of blood-soaked terrorism Palestinians have committed against Israeli citizens in schools, hotels, on flights, in cafes, and at hitchhiking posts. There is a scrap of comfort in Zoabi's perverse focus on Kristallnacht. After all, most Palestinian leaders deny the Holocaust ever happened.
What is Hanin Zoabi thinking?
מערכת ישראל היום
מערכת "ישראל היום“ מפיקה ומעדכנת תכנים חדשותיים, מבזקים ופרשנויות לאורך כל שעות היממה. התוכן נערך בקפדנות, נבדק עובדתית ומוגש לציבור מתוך האמונה שהקוראים ראויים לעיתונות טובה יותר - אמינה, אובייקטיבית ועניינית.
