The United States Was Just Called a "Plague" by Mahmoud Abbas. Now what?

What do Palestinian leaders say when they are not speaking in English?

For decades, Yasser Arafat spoke of peace in English—but only in English. In Arabic, not a word about peace and compromise.  In Arabic, not a word about peace and compromise. (Here, from 1997, is an example of the many articles about this phenomenon.)

But Arafat has been dead since 2004, and Mahmoud Abbas has been the leader of the PLO, Fatah Party, and the Palestinian Authority. What does he say when he is not speaking English—and more pointedly, what does he say about the United States?

The invaluable MEMRI, the Middle East Media Research Institute, just supplied the video of Abbas’s speech on August 15 to the Turkish parliament.

He began this way:

Allow me, dear brothers and sisters, to start my speech by praying for the souls of the tens of thousands of martyrs who have met their Lord because of the Israeli aggression and the war of genocide and ethnic cleansing that [Israel] is waging against our people in Gaza, the West Bank, and Jerusalem. The latest [incident] was the crime against the leader and martyr Ismail Haniyeh.

Those words are a full endorsement of Hamas and a claim that every Hamas terrorist killed by Israel—including those who conducted the bestial murders, rapes, burnings, and maimings on October 7 of men, women and children—is a martyr.

Then we come to the United States. Abbas said this:

The U.S. has used its veto power in the Security Council three times, against the world's demand to stop the Israeli aggression in the Gaza Strip. Three times, the U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. stood up in the Security Council, and used the veto power, all by herself, while the other 14 members demanded to stop the fighting. This is America. America is the plague, and the plague is America.

According to the State Department on June 11, “The United States will provide an additional $404 million in lifesaving humanitarian aid to support Palestinian civilians in Gaza, the West Bank, and the region, bringing the total U.S. assistance to more than $674 million over the past eight months.” Moreover, the United States is “the largest single country humanitarian donor to the Palestinian people.” In the last thirty years, total U.S. aid to the Palestinian people is over $5 billion.

Perhaps it is too much, in the rough and tumble of international politics, to ask for or expect gratitude. But it is more than a little surprising to see the leader of the Palestinians say “America is the plague, and the plague is America.”

One wonders if the State Department—so sensitive these days to the speeches of Israeli politicians—has condemned Abbas’s statement.

One wonders what the average American would say if confronted with those words from Abbas, and then asked if American tax dollars should continue to flow to that man. Well, actually, one does not wonder; it’s crystal clear.

The United States will be treated this way by Abbas, and others, as long as they think they can get away with it.

Abbas should not get away with this. A retraction and apology should be demanded, and until it is received not one more dime should move. No self-respecting country should permit itself to be treated this way. We are happily past the ages when such comments led to duels among men or wars among nations. But paying for such insults ought to be out of the question.