'Western anti-Israel activists protest against PA'

Senior PA official to 'Post': “We will be forced to cut off all ties with non-Palestinians who incite against Palestinian leadership."

By KHALED ABU TOAMEH
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas 370 (R) (photo credit: Luis Galdamez / Reuters)
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas 370 (R)
(photo credit: Luis Galdamez / Reuters)
Anti-Israel foreign nationals living in the West Bank participated in recent protests against the Palestinian Authority, a senior PA official in Ramallah charged Tuesday.
The official told The Jerusalem Post that at least 10 Western activists who came to the West Bank to take part in demonstrations against Israel participated in two anti-PA protests in Ramallah.
“The involvement of Western nationals in protests against the Palestinian Authority is completely unacceptable,” the official said. “We will be forced to cut off all ties with non-Palestinians who incite against the Palestinian leadership.”
The Western activists who took part in anti-PA protests are affiliated with a number of anti-Israel NGOs, the official revealed.
In the past two weeks, Palestinians staged a number of demonstrations in Ramallah in which anti-Israel Western activists were involved.
The first protest, which was organized by a group called Palestinians for Dignity, was held to demand the cancellation of a planned visit to Ramallah by Vice Premier Shaul Mofaz.
PA policemen and intelligence officers used force to prevent the protesters from marching on PA President Mahmoud Abbas’s presidential compound. At least seven protesters and five journalists were wounded in the confrontation.
The second demonstration was held a few days later to protest against police brutality.
A third demonstration was held last week in Ramallah, where protesters called for the abrogation of the Oslo Accords and demanded the return of all Palestinian refugees to their original villages and homes inside Israel.
A PA security source in Ramallah said that a number of Western nationals took part in all three protests.
According to the source, a special commission of inquiry set up by Abbas to investigate the assault on protesters and journalists in Ramallah has discovered that “non-Palestinians” played a role in organizing and leading the demonstrations.
Hundreds of Western activists live in Ramallah and surrounding villages and take part in weekly protests against settlements and the West Bank security barrier.