Originally published at the Gatestone Institute.

While Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas was meeting in his office in Ramallah with Shelly Yachimovich, chairwoman of Israel’s opposition Labor Party, his Fatah faction was busy threatening Palestinians who meet with Israelis.

That Abbas continues to meet with Israelis on a regular basis in Ramallah does not seem to bother Fatah.

Nor does Fatah seem to be bothered that Palestinian security officers work closely together with their Israeli counterparts. That is called “security coordination” between the Palestinians and Israel.

But when Palestinian youths are invited to meet with Israelis as part of an interfaith dialogue project, Fatah is quick to issue denunciations and threats.

When Palestinian and Israeli teenagers are invited to play football together as part of a project to promote peace and coexistence, Fatah is also quick to react.

But Fatah has no problem when Abbas or any top Palestinian official meets with Israelis.

Nor does Fatah have a problem with some of its senior representatives carrying Israeli-issued VIP cards that grant them various privileges that are denied to most Palestinians, such as permission to enter Israel and avoid waiting at Israel Defense Force checkpoints.

Palestinian youths from Hebron, though, who met with Israelis near Bethlehem to share their problems and insights have been forced to issue a statement distancing themselves from the meeting.

Following threats from Fatah, which condemned the event as a form of “normalization” with Israel, the Palestinian participants claimed that they had been “misled” regarding the true goals of the meeting.

This claim was clearly issued because of the “anti-normalization” campaign waged by Fatah over the past few years. This is a campaign that — in the context of “peace” and “coexistence” projects that are often sponsored and funded by the European Union and the U.S. — aims at banning meetings between Israeli and Palestinians.

The most recent victims of the anti-normalization drive are Palestinian boys and girls who committed the “crime” of playing in a football match against Israeli teenagers. When pictures of the match appeared in the media, Fatah rushed to issue threats against the Palestinian players and those behind the tournament.

Organizers of the “anti-normalization” campaign, most of whom belong to Abbas’s Fatah faction, have been boasting that, in recent years, they have succeeded in thwarting dozens of planned meetings between Israelis and Palestinians.

But Fatah has not condemned its own leader, Abbas, for meeting with Yachimovich and other Israelis.

The real problem here is that Abbas himself has not come out against Fatah’s campaign of intimidation and threats. By remaining silent, Abbas in fact appears to have endorsed the “anti-normalization” campaign — at least so long as its does not affect him personally.

The Fatah activists who are threatening Palestinian teenagers and youths for talking to Israelis and playing football with them are the same people who claim, at least in public, that they support the peace process with Israel.

But how can there ever be a peace process when any Palestinian who meets with an Israeli is immediately denounced as a traitor? It is worth noting that most of these denunciations are coming from the “moderate” Fatah, and not from Hamas.

It now remains to be seen how Fatah will react if and when U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry persuades Abbas to return to the negotiating table with Israel. Will Fatah condemn Abbas for advocating “normalization with the Israeli enemy” when he sits at the negotiating table? Or will Fatah continue to go only after Palestinian boys and girls who just want to have fun and play football?

Originally published at the Gatestone Institute.

Israelis by a 4-to-1 margin are more confident than Palestinians in how President Barack Obama a handles his foreign policy, according to a Pew Research Center poll released Thursday.

The survey revealed that 61 percent of Israelis “express confidence in the American president to do the right thing regarding world affairs,” as opposed to 15 percent of Palestinian Authority Arabs.

Obama’s numbers among Israelis are a 12 point increase over when the same question was asked in 2011, reflecting the consensus after the president’s visit to Israel in March. His speeches were viewed in  Jerusalem and Ramallah won broad support from Israelis and anger from the Palestinian Authority.

The president’s emphasis on Israel’s security needs and the Jewish connection to the region stood in stark opposition to PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas’ continued refusal to recognize Israel as a Jewish state.

Asked to assess whether Obama should increase or decrease his role in peacemaking, or keep it at current levels, 49 percent of Israeli respondents wanted to see greater involvement, 29 percent the same level and 15 percent less involvement.

Among Palestinians, the numbers were 41 percent wanting greater involvement, 19 percent wanting the same and 26 percent wanting less.

Israeli intelligence and security officers again have foiled an imminent plot against soldiers and civilians, this time by a Hamas cell in the Ramallah area that worked with partners in terror from Hamas.

The problem is who knows how many more terrorist cells have stayed under Israel’s radar? The IDF reported that last month there were hundreds of rock-throwing and firebombing attacks by Palestinian Authority Arabs who have not yet graduated to the stage of guns and knives.

One “graduate” stabbed to death a Jew from Samaria last on the, and the terrorist’s father said the 24-year-old murdered carried out “the duty of all Palestinians who suffer from the aggression of the army and the settlers,” stated al-Zaghal’s father, Ali al-Zaghal.

One day after the stabbing death of Eviatar Borovzky, father of five. The Fatah party, headed by IDF PA Chairman Mahmoud Abba, posted on its Facebook page praise for the terrorist.

The Hamas cell in the Ramallah area that was arrested by the Israel Security Agency (Shin Bet) and the IDF is one of many that exist with the encouragement of Abbas’s party.

The Israel Security Agency (Shin Bet) and the IDF arrested the cell month earlier this year. The   arrests were announced in March, but details of the plots were not released until Wednesday, when indictments were filed.

The ringleader is a layer from a Ramallah village and who was identified as 26-year-old Ahmed Fahida, who worked with a Hamas terrorist from Gaza, named Ahmed Uda. Fahida’s mission to kidnap a soldier and use him for negotiations with Israel before killing him,

Fahida and another unnamed terrorist also were ready to collect weapons and build rockets and escalate the war against Israelis in Judea and Samaria and in urban centers.

Even a primitive Kassam rocket launched from Samaria could inflict huge damage and loss of life with a strike in Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, or the Ben Gurion Airport. It also would cause political and diplomatic earthquake in Jerusalem and Washington.

Despite the success in stopping most major terrorist attacks, so far, the IDF has been at a loss to protect Israeli motorists on the roads.

A total of 615 rock-throwing attacks were reported in March. That is a rate of 20 a day and does not include dozens or hundreds of others that are not reported.

In addition, at least 72 firebombs were hurled at soldiers and civilians last month.

In the last week of April alone, 119 rock-throwing attacks and 18 firebomb attack were recorded.

Justice Minister Tzipi Livni, who is Prime Minister Netanyahu’s de facto “peace process minister,” is in Washington for talks with U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, who is fresh from winning a supposed “concession” from the Arab League for the American-sponsored peace process.

Kerry has come up with a proposal to adopt most of the Saudi 2002 Peace Initiative, which is virtually everything that Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas has demanded.

Kerry’s mission is to make a deal. Getting Israel and the Palestinian Authority to agree on the final status of an independent Arab country under the aegis of the Palestinian Authority would be a glorious triumph for Kerry, possibly the stepping stone to the White House in  2016.

To get there, he is taking the course of least resistance, meaning the Israeli government.

Enter his real peace partner, Tzipi Livni.

Prime Minister Netanyahu holds the portfolio of Foreign Minister until there is a court decision on whether Avigdor Lieberman is guilty of fraud or can return to his former post. In the meantime, Netanyahu hurriedly bought Livni’s tiny party of six Knesset Members into the government by granting her the responsibility for handling the American effort for Palestinian Authority peace talks, one of Livni’s pet hobbies.

She and Kerry have the same goal, a deal at any cost with the prize of international admiration.

He came away from a meeting with the Arab League last week and tried to sell Israel a bill of goods of the Great Concession: The Arab supposedly are prepared to amend the Saudi 2002 Peace Initiative and back “land swaps,” meaning Israel would have their approval for sovereignty over a small amount of the land that was restored to the country in the Six-Day War in 1967.

In return, Israel would fork over an equal amount of land that has been part of the country since 1948.

Qatari Prime Minister Sheik al-Thani, whose kingdom has been unusually aggressive in handing out fat checks to Hamas and is pouring money into Arab areas of Jerusalem as well as the Palestinian Authority, led the Arab League delegation.

He agreed that perhaps – maybe if this and maybe if that, and if Israel behaves – the League could agree to “minor” land swaps.

For Kerry, this was a big concession. He “broke” the back of the Arabs and all that is left for him to do is tell Israel it is the best thing for the country since felafel.

“The Arab League delegation affirmed … the two-state solution on the basis of the 4th of June 1967 line, with the (possibility) of comparable and mutual agreed minor swap of the land,” he declared.

Of course, no one has any idea of what “minor” land swaps could mean, but you can rest your bottom dinar it does not mean that Israel would retain Gush Etzion. Maaleh Adumim? Maybe. Maybe not.

Perhaps the Jerusalem neighborhoods of Ramot, French Hill, Pisgat Ze’ev and Talpiot, among others? Could be.

And Gilo? Probably not.

It does not matter now. The most important thing for Kerry and Livni, his one-woman Israeli government fan club, is to talk it up. It does not matter to them that Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal already has rejected the idea. But they can take of him later and drop Hamas from the list of outlawed terrorist organizations, make it a legal terrorist group, and everything will be just fine.

Livni said the Qatari prime minister’s grand concession of possibly, just maybe, agreeing to a  minor land swap was “very positive news.”

And what would land would Israel give up in this “minor” swap. Most likely, enough land to link Gaza with Judea and Samaria.

Of course there is one not so minor point that Kerry has forgotten. Actually, he has not forgotten because the State Dept. does not know any better.

What Israeli Arab in his right mind would give up all the benefits and security he gets from the Israeli government and become subjects of the Palestinian Authority in order to help Kerry’s political career?

Egypt is urging Palestinian Authority PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas to postpone elections while trying to convince the rival Hamas terrorist organization to drop demands for simultaneous presidential and legislative elections.

Holding elections at this time, which already is four years after Abbas’ mandate has expired, would torpedo efforts for a unity government, sauces told the Egyptian Asharq Al-Awsat newspaper.

The possibility of holding elections in Judea, Samaria and Gaza is virtually non-existent, according to the report. Sources also said that merging the Fatah and Hamas armies, both of which include terrorist units, would harm the process of reconciliation.

Hamas and Fatah underwent a bloody separation during a terrorist militia war in Gaza six years ago in which Fatah suffered heavy losses, leaving Abbas in charge of Judea and Samaria and Ismail Haniyeh as de facto Gaza Prime Minister of Gaza.

The leader of the Council of Jewish Communities in Judea and Samaria (Yesha) filed a complaint with police, charging Haaretz journalist Amira Hass with incitement by writing that Palestinian Authority Arabs have a “duty” to throw rocks at Jews.

She wrote her article after an Israeli court found a Hevron cab driver guilty of murder for throwing rocks and causing the fatal cash of a car driven by American-Israeli citizen Asher Palmer 18 months ago. Palmer and his two-year-old son were killed when he lost control of his vehicle and smashed into a guard rail near Kiryat Arba.

The rock-throwing terrorist, Wael Salaman Mohammed el-Arjeh, confessed to throwing rocks but denied he intended to murder anyone.

Hass, a Jewish journalist who has lived in Gaza and Ramallah and fully supports the Palestinian Authority, wrote, “Throwing stones is the birthright and duty of anyone subject to foreign rule. Throwing stones is an action as well as a metaphor of resistance.”

Ron Shechner, a former assistant to Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz in the Sharon government and now director of Yesha, told the Jewish Press he filed the complaint with police because Hass’ article directly incites violence against Jews.

Hours after the complaint was filed with Jerusalem police, rioting Palestinian Authority Arabs stoned dozens of cars on the highway from Jerusalem to Kiryat Arab-Hevron.

Hass sees no problem with rock-throwing, which usually is aimed at causing drivers to lose control of their vehicles and crash, as happened to Palmer.

If Hass’s car were stoned by Arab attackers, she no doubt would blame Israel, which she said is a reality of violence and whose soldiers, “bureaucrats, jurists and lawyers…protect the fruits of violence instilled in foreign occupation − resources, profits, power and privileges.”

She justified stone-throwers by stating it often “is borne of boredom, excessive hormones, mimicry, boastfulness and competition” and is a message that, “We’ve had enough of you, occupiers.”

Hass advised Palestinian Authority schools to introduce basic classes in resistance: how to build multiple “tower and stockade” villages in Area C; how to behave when army troops enter your homes; comparing different struggles against colonialism in different countries; how to use a video camera to document the violence of the regime’s representatives; methods to exhaust the military system and its representatives; a weekly day of work in the lands beyond the separation barrier;

“How to remember identifying details of soldiers who flung you handcuffed to the floor of the jeep, in order to submit a complaint; the rights of detainees and how to insist on them in real time; how to overcome fear of interrogators; and mass efforts to realize the right of movement.”

Ironically, the same advice could be written for Jewish right-wing activists.

Back in July of 2001, the Hebron Jewish community sued Ha’aretz, after Amira Hass had written that the residents of Beit Hadassah in Hevron abused the corpse of a terrorist. She wrote that the residents kicked, spat on, and danced atop the body of a dead Arab terrorist, who had just been shot and killed by soldiers shortly after he threw a grenade at them.

The plaintiffs cited an announcement by the IDF spokesman at the time asserting that the Jewish residents did not abuse the body in any manner. The Hebron residents demanded an apology, which Ha’aretz did not provide. They then sued the paper for 250 thousand shekels (about $70 thousand), and Ha’aretz did not even submit a defense. So Judge Shalev Gertel awarded the full sum to the Hebron community, plus 20 thousand shekels (about $5,500) for legal expenses.

Yori Yanover contributed to this report.

Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Salam Fayyad was hospitalized on Monday after being feeling ill at his office in the Finance Ministry, which he temporarily heads, according to the Bethlehem-based Ma’an news agency.

Fayyad was rushed to a Ramallah hospital reportedly was in stable condition.

Following Washington and Jerusalem’s decisions to fork over more money to the debt-ridden Palestinian Authority without requiring it to pay off its debts to Israel for electricity, the Israel Electric Corp, is considering raising electricity rates for Israelis to cover Ramallah’s debt.

Israel supplies almost all of the electricity for Jews and Arabs in Judea and Samaria. The Palestinian Authority and the Jerusalem District Electricity Company are responsible for collecting money from Arabs and paying Israel.

After PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas again violated the Oslo Accords last November, this time by going to the United Nations General Assembly for a resolution recognizing the Palestinian Authority on its own terms, Finance Minister Yuval Steinitz triumphantly stopped the monthly transfer of tax money Israel collects for the PA and handed over the cash to the Israel Electric Corp. to pay off most, but not all, of the constantly growing debt of the Palestinian Authority for electricity.

That was before President Barack Obama visited Israel and softened up Prime Minister Netanyahu to make another one of countless “goodwill” gestures to Abbas and release monthly tax revenues.

Of course, Abbas has other sources to pay off the debt for electricity, such as the American taxpayer.

But the Obama administration, Washington’s version of Chelm, thinks that American money should be used to help Abbas to bloat his debt instead of paying it off.

After the president’s return to the United States, he came up with his own goodwill measure, and with the kind support of U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, the United States freed up $200 million for direct financial support for the Palestinian Authority budget, no strings attached.

Following Israel’s Cabinet decision to free the tax revenues, Israeli Electricity Corp., sources told Israel’s Globes business newspaper that the company now has less of a chance to collect money from the Palestinian Authority. “If there is no alternative, the utility will have to record the debt in its books as lost debt and ask the Public Utilities Authority to recognize it as an expense to be covered by electricity tariffs,” according to the newspaper’s website.

Rates will have to be increased approximately 3 percent for one year to cover the debt, but that is only for electricity and does not cover other PA debts.

Three percent would not be so bad by itself, but it would come on top of a 6.5 percent hike that was approved only two weeks ago.