Here is one point I made in my speech yesterday, that I hadn’t thought of before preparing for it.
In 1974, after several years of airplane hijackings and other terror attacks, Yasir Arafat went to the UN and gave a speech. The architect of terror suddenly became an honored diplomat.
The most famous phrase from his speech was, “Today I have come bearing an olive branch and a freedom-fighter’s gun. Do not let the olive branch fall from my hand. I repeat: do not let the olive branch fall from my hand.”
Think about what he is saying. He is saying that the world must do what Palestinians want it to do, or else there will be more terror.
It was a threat!
A normal man can hold an olive branch, or a gun, or both. A normal man makes the decision whether he wants to be peaceful or violent, whether he embraces peace or war.
Arafat is saying that the decision as to whether he will drop the olive branch is up to the world pressuring Israel to give in to terrorist demands. He refuses to drop the “freedom fighter’s gun” and his choice to pretend to also hold an olive branch depends entirely on other people doing his desire.
It is a mafia-style “offer you can’t refuse” – and the nations of the world gave him a standing ovation.
It is part of a larger pattern of using threats to get the world to pressure Israel, and it has worked brilliantly, to the present day.
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