# Posted 11:00 PM by Ariel David Adesnik  

A PALESTINIAN CULTURE OF DEATH? Three months ago, as part of an extended debate with my colleague 'P', I attempted to answer the question "Why am I pro-Israel?" An important part of my answer to that question was that:

The total number of Palestinian suicide bombers -- both attempted and successful -- seems to be no more than a few hundred. Yet my sense is that there is much broader social infrastructure necessary to support such attacks. There are those who make the bombs. Those who train the bombers. Those who provide the funding. Those who capture the final testament of the bombers on video. How many individuals play such a supporting role? Perhaps a few thousand.

But the two kinds of supporters that frighten me most are the political leaders and the mothers of the suicide operatives. I have heard interviews with parents who swell with pride at the fact that their child gave his or her life in order to kill Israeli civilians. This indicates me to me that tens or hundreds of thousands of Palestinians are part of a soceity that values death and endless conflict much more than compromise and life.

P responded as follows:

For a culture that prides itself on assuming innocence until guilt is proven, we sure are quick to judge and condemn vast groupings of Arabs and Muslims whenever we feel like it. (Never mind that when we make disparaging comments about Palestinians, we are also impugning many Palestinian Christians, Samaritans, Socialists, Communists, secular progressives, etc.)

Instead of answering [David's question], I'm tempted to counter an absurd question (actually a thinly-veiled accusation) with the roughly analogous, "Prove to me that Israel isn't a cult of death and destruction after it just destroyed half of Lebanon and killed about 1,000 innocent people (one-third of them children, six of them U.N. observers or personnel) and then littered vast civilian areas with a million cluster bomblets for no militarily justifiable reason."

P's response raises some very significant questions about the ethics of war, but it never grapples with the fundamental question I raise in my post. I am not interested in whether Israelis or Palestinians have taken more innocent lives. My question is why so many Palestinians seem to celebrate the taking of innocent Israeli lives.

Like 'P', I hope to see the day when Jewish and Palestinian states will live side by side, in peace. Yet I fear that no such day will ever come if enough Palestinians believe in sacrificing their own children in order to kill the greatest possible number of Israelis. Or as Golda Meir put it long ago, “We will have peace with the Arabs when they love their children more than they hate us”.

Given how violence and extremism attract attention, I would not be surprised if those Palestinians who do advocate suicide operations get considerably more press coverage than those who don't. Thus, what kind of evidence might be necessary to determine how influential the culture of death and martyrdom is within the Palestnian population?

I certainly can't provide a definitive answer to that question, although I can report on the evidence provided in a new documentary by Pierre Rehov entitled "Suicide Killers". Be warned, this is not a comprehensive portrayal of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. It is a very focused examination of Palestinian suicide attacks. Israeli human rights violations are mentioned only in passing. Israelis in this film are primarily victims of terror.

Yet this shortage of context doesn't automatically invalidate the film's evidence that a passion for hatred and death are instilled in far too many Palestinian children.

The film's greatest strength is the extensive footage in which aspiring young martyrs are allowed to explain their motivations at length. In most cases, these would-be martyrs are available for interviews because their attacks failed and now they are in prison. There is one interivew, however, with a young man in a mask now training to become a martyr.

What is most striking about these attempted martyrs is not what they say, but how they say it. They are candid, calm, sincere and articulate. They are not wild, angry, loud or desperate or insane. These men and women have considered very carefully what they would do and whey they would do it.

As one might expect, the bombers' motivation is what they believe to be the message of the Koran. Sacrificing oneself to kill the enemy is pleasing to God, who rewards his servants in heaven.

Considered in isolation, the bombers themselves tells us very little about Palestinian society or culture. Did they become what they are because they are unusual individuals, or because their society values what they have become?

One answer to that question is provide through interviews with the parents and siblings of successful martyrs. Some are saddened by their loved ones' decision. Yet there are also parents who described how they raised their children from the very beginning to become martyrs.

The film also provides footage of young boys in a paramilitary summer camp. A staff member at the camp then explains that it is preparing the boys for struggle and martyrdom. The film also includes footage of various parades in which children are dressed up as martyrs, with white hoods over their faces and fake dynamite around their waists.

What it's impossible to know on the basis of this film is how extensive such behavior is and how the majority of Palestinians feels about it. I certainly would not conclude on the basis of this film that there is a Palestinian culture of death. It's evidence is impressionistic, not systematic.

Yet how can there be even a few score or a few hundred children raised to wear masks and dynamite? As it turns out, one of the proud mothers of three martyrs is known as Umm Nidal and was elected to parliament on the Hamas ticket in 2006. During the campaign, Umm Nidal was very candid about the pride she has in her martyred sons.

What does this mean? Clearly, the most effective and popular political organization in the West Bank and Gaza not only tolerates but takes pride in the perverse ideology of suicide murder. And what does that say about Palestinian culture as a whole? I'm not sure.

In the aftermath of Hamas' victory at the polls, many explained Palestinian voting behavior as a rejection of Fatah's corruption and incompetence rather than an endorsement of Hamas' vicious ideology. Yet Palestinians seemed to be fully aware of what Hamas stood and did not let it deter them.

Personally, I would like to learn more about the messages broadcast by the Palestinian media, clergy, and educational system. Once in passing, the film refers to Palestinian schools that glorify martyrdom. But we see no direct evidence. The film also includes several clips from Palestinian and Lebanese television that are violently anti-Semitic. Although I wouldn't be surprised if the film chose some of the most provocative clips, the simple fact that influential media chose repeatedly to broadcast such terrible hate speech implies that there is a significant audience for it.

This post will not end with any firm conclusions. Yet one cannot dismiss as absurd or racist the hypothesis that Palestinian suicide bombers are the product of their culture and not an exception to it. At the same time, far more evidence is required before reaching the conclusion that a collection of highly disturbing images represents an accurate portrayal of mainstream Palestinian opinion.

Labels: Israel, Palestinians

(15) opinions -- Add your opinion