“The definition of insanity,” Albert Einstein allegedly said, “is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” If so, a recent proposal by a sitting member of Congress to release a convicted terrorist is insane for more reasons than one.
“Today I’m calling for the release of Marwan Barghouti from Israeli prison,” Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA) announced on Sept. 25. “Palestinians must choose their own leaders,” the California Democrat asserted.
Barghouti is seen as “non-corrupt, a strong leader, and secular” and he “could deliver a Palestinian state living in peace with Israel,” Khanna said in a videotaped statement that his office shared widely on social media. Barghouti’s release is needed to “move peace forward,” he added. “We must begin to give Palestinians a voice in their sovereignty and the peace process.”
IT COULD HAVE BEEN ISRAEL’S 9/11. THE MEDIA CALLED IT A ‘MIDAIR ALTERCATION’
The congressman omitted a key fact about his prospective Palestinian peace partner: he’s a convicted murderer.
Barghouti was convicted in June 2004 for five counts of murder and membership in a terrorist organization. Barghouti was the head of the Tanzim faction of Fatah and a founder of the al Aksa Martyrs Brigade, a U.S.-designated terrorist group.
Barghouti became infamous during the second intifada, in which Palestinian terrorists launched dozens of attacks and murdered and injured more than 1,000 Israelis from 2000 until 2005.
In the more than two decades since his conviction, Barghouti has frequently been mentioned as a possible contender to succeed Mahmoud Abbas, the 90-year-old head of the Fatah movement who serves as president of the Palestinian Authority, which rules over much of the West Bank.
Abbas is in the 21st year of what was supposed to be a four-year term, and he is deeply unpopular. By contrast, polls from the Palestinian Survey and Research Center, among others, consistently show Barghouti to be popular with Palestinians in both Gaza and the West Bank.
But Barghouti is popular because of his murderous deeds, not in spite of them.
The terrorist chieftain ordered an attack that murdered a Greek Orthodox monk in 2001, an Israeli in 2002, and another assault in 2002 at the Seafood Market Restaurant in Tel Aviv, where another three Israelis were murdered and more than a dozen were injured. The Tanzim faction of Fatah, which Barghouti led, was responsible for dozens of other attacks.
Khanna isn’t alone in calling for Barghouti’s release. A number of celebrities and NGOs have likewise suggested that the imprisoned murderer could somehow become a Nelson Mandela-like figure.
But history suggests otherwise.
In the 1920s, the British backed Amin al Husseini to be the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, the preeminent religious and political figure in British-ruled Mandate Palestine. They pardoned Husseini for his role in orchestrating a pogrom in 1920 that left five Jews dead and scores more injured.
Husseini was then elevated over other, more moderate, candidates for the religious office. Some thought Husseini might prove to be more conciliatory once he was empowered.
The opposite proved to be true: Husseini launched a wave of terrorism in the 1930s, murdering Jews, British officials, and his Arab rivals. Husseini later allied with the Nazis during World War II and was a wanted war criminal nicknamed “Hitler’s Mufti” by the conflict’s end.
In the 1990s, the United States repeated the British Empire’s mistake. Husseini’s distant cousin, Yasser Arafat, had waged a ceaseless terrorism war on the Jewish state for decades. But some U.S. and Israeli officials convinced themselves that he, too, could suddenly become a “moderate.”
Arafat and his Palestine Liberation Organization, bereft of funds after the collapse of their Soviet patron, were more than happy to feign moderation in exchange for Western aid.
Arafat pledged to renounce terrorism, and in exchange, the PLO was given limited self-rule in Gaza and the West Bank. But Arafat lied.
The PLO head and now president of the newly created Palestinian Authority launched wave after wave of murderous terrorist attacks in the 1990s, alternatively working with and against his chief rival for power, Hamas. The second intifada soon followed.
Arafat and his successor Abbas rejected several Israeli peace offers in exchange for statehood. And in 2006, a year after Israel withdrew from Gaza, Hamas won the Palestinian elections and vanquished Abbas’s Fatah movement from Gaza.
Hamas won for two reasons. First, it was viewed as less corrupt than Fatah and its aging cadre. Second, its more militant call for the destruction of Israel resonated with Gazans.
FLYDUBAI DIDN’T SUFFER A RANDOM ACT OF TERRORISM. IT SCHEDULED ONE
More than half a dozen wars with Israel have followed.
In short: Khanna’s suggestion of empowering a “hardline” terrorist to achieve peace has been tried more than once. And it has always resulted in more bloodshed, not less.
Sean Durns is the director for the Counter Extremism Research Center at the Capital Research Center.