'Abbas claims Zionists, Nazis linked before WWII'

PA president quoted as saying PM agreed to let refugees flee Syria to West Bank; spokesman denies Abbas linked Zionism, Nazism.

By KHALED ABU TOAMEH
Abbas 521 (photo credit: Marc Israël Sellem )
Abbas 521
(photo credit: Marc Israël Sellem )
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas was quoted on Monday as saying that the Zionist movement had links with the Nazis before World War II.
Abbas was speaking during a lengthy interview with Al-Mayadeen, a Beirutbased TV station that is affiliated with Hezbollah and Iran.
The full interview will be broadcast later this week.
Asked about allegations that he was a Holocaust denier, Abbas said that he had “70 more books that I still haven’t published” about the alleged link between the Zionist movement and the Nazis.
“I challenge anyone to deny the relationship between Zionism and Nazism before World War II,” Abbas said.
The PA president also claimed that Israel had agreed to his request to allow some 150,000 Palestinian refugees living in Syria to move to the West Bank.
However, Abbas said that he turned down Israel’s condition that the refugees sign a document in which they relinquish their demand to return to their former homes inside Israel.
The Prime Minister’s Office unequivocally denied that Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu consented to a request for Palestinian refugees from Syria to be allowed entrance into the West Bank.
The PMO declined to comment on other statements Abbas made on the Lebanon television station, with one government official saying only that they were “full of inaccuracies.”
Abbas, who is currently visiting Saudi Arabia, also told the television station that he was the target of assassination attempts, but did not elaborate.
Nabil Abu Rudaineh, a spokesman for Abbas, denied on Monday night that the PA president had talked about a link between Zionism and Nazism.
Abu Rudaineh said that Abbas remained committed to the peace process with Israel.