While Mahmoud Abbas is once again professing his commitment to peace, his actions during both Donald Trump’s first term in office and throughout the Biden administration tell a very different story.
Following the U.S. election, Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas phoned President-elect Donald Trump to wish him “success in his upcoming term in office” and to reaffirm “his readiness to work with President Trump in pursuit of a just and comprehensive peace, based on international legitimacy and principles.”
While Abbas is once again professing his commitment to peace, his actions, during both President Trump’s first term in office and throughout the Biden administration, tell a very different story.
If Abbas wants Trump to take him seriously, there are five requirements Abbas must meet to demonstrate his genuine commitment.
- Unequivocally Condemn The Oct. 7 Massacre.
Abbas and the P.A. have never condemned Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023 invasion of southern Israel. Quite the opposite. In the days following the massacre, Abbas’s Fatah organization bragged that it had participated in the attack and that its members “killed soldiers and stepped on their heads.” Palestinian leaders even went as far as to declare that the massacre was “a war of defense full of epics and acts of heroism.”
The reason Abbas has not condemned the massacre is that from the point of view of the P.A., the PLO and Abbas himself, terrorism is a justifiable expression of the Palestinian right to “resist.”
For Abbas and the P.A., Hamas and the other Palestinian terror organizations that participated in the massacre, including members of his own Fatah Al Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades, are not terrorist organizations, but rather legitimate “Palestinian factions,” which should all unite under the unified banner of the PLO.
It is thus not surprising that the P.A. security forces, substantially funded by the United States, are doing little if anything to combat terror. Indeed, in an ever-growing number of cases, P.A. security personnel actively participate in terror.
If Abbas wants to convince President-elect Trump or anyone else that he has changed and is now genuinely interested in promoting peace, he needs to openly, in Arabic, unequivocally condemn the Oct. 7 massacre and expel the Palestinian terror organizations, rather than embrace them. For this purpose, Abbas’s usual condemnation of “terror on all sides” is insufficient.
He also needs to implement urgent reforms and ensure that the P.A. security forces are actively fighting terror rather than participating in it.
- Abolish “Pay for Slay.”
One of the most offensive policies implemented daily by the P.A. is its “pay for slay” system. As part of this policy, which is partially entrenched in P.A. law and partially entrenched in regulations of the PLO), the P.A./PLO pays hundreds of millions of dollars every year to Palestinians who participated in terror attacks. Paid in the form of monthly salaries and stipends to terrorists and their families, this funding promotes, incentivizes and rewards terror. According to P.A. law, all Palestinian terrorists, including those who participated in the Oct. 7 massacre, are “a fighting sector and integral part of the fabric of Arab Palestinian society.”
In 2018 during Trump’s first term, the United States passed the bi-partisan Taylor Force Act (TFA). The act conditioned future direct U.S. aid to the P.A. on the abolishment of the “pay-for-slay” policy. Openly flouting and rejecting the legislation, the P.A. has continued implementing the policy without respite. Reaffirming his commitment to continue the policy at all costs, Abbas responded to Trump and Congress by repeatedly saying that even if the P.A. is left with only one penny in its coffers, that penny would be paid first to the terrorists.
Immediately upon the election of President Joe Biden and even before he took office, P.A. officials rushed to tell The New York Times of their intention to fundamentally change the policy.
Four years later, despite having had the attentive ear of the Biden administration, no changes to the policy were implemented by Abbas, the P.A., or the PLO.
In fact, Abbas’s actions show that his commitment to continue the policy, even to the last P.A. penny, was no mere posturing. Rather, it is a reflection of the unwavering commitment of himself, the P.A. and the PLO to continue promoting, incentivizing and rewarding terrorism. This commitment is so steadfast that in some years, the P.A.’s payments to terrorists constituted a staggering 7.47% of its entire operational budget. Ignoring the Taylor Force Act, and the consequences of Israeli legislation, from 2018 through 2023, the PA/PLO paid over a billion dollars in financial rewards to terrorists.
To show his bona fide intentions, Abbas must immediately announce and implement the complete abolition of the P.A.’s “pay-for-slay” policy.
- Stop Delegitimization of Israel And Incitement to Violence.
Implementing the “Plan of Stages,” Abbas, the PLO and the P.A. have used the territory they were given under the Oslo Accords to continue the assault on Israel. To this end, in the international arena, Abbas, the P.A. and the PLO have engaged in a relentless effort to delegitimize the Jewish state. Using every forum to undermine Israel’s right to exist as the nation-state of the Jewish people, Abbas has spared no effort. From attacking Israel in the United Nations, the International Court of Justice, the International Criminal Court and other fora to accusing Israel of committing “50 Holocausts,” Abbas and the Palestinian propaganda machine have made a concerted effort to falsely paint Israel as an “apartheid country,” created illegitimately, and whose very existence poses a threat to global security. Any country or leader, including President-elect Trump, who did not kowtow to the Palestinian narrative became the focus of loathing and ridicule.
At the same time, in the local arena, the P.A. and PLO made incitement to violence and terror as well as the dehumanization of Jews and Israelis into a daily staple. Palestinian parents were poisoned and convinced that the death of their brainwashed children in attempts to murder Jews was a noble deed worthy of praise.
Instead of presenting leaders of industry and innovators as role models for Palestinian society, Abbas, the P.A. and the PLO glorify terrorist murderers, raise them on a pedestal and tell Palestinians that their actions are to be emulated.
Cumulatively, it was this education to hate, indoctrination and dehumanization of Jews that led to the Oct. 7 massacre.
President-elect Trump has already questioned whether Abbas was lying to him about the Palestinian incitement of terror.
If Abbas seeks to convince anyone, specifically Trump, of his ostensible commitment to peace, he must publicly acknowledge and accept Israel’s right to exist as the nation-state of the Jewish people, immediately cease all incitement to terror and the glorification of terrorists, and fundamentally overhaul the P.A. school curriculum.
- Agree to the Resettlement of The Palestinian “Refugees.”
For decades, the Palestinian “refugees” have been cruelly and cynically held in limbo, both in an attempt to keep the Israeli-Arab conflict alive and as a means to perpetuate the fallacy that they will eventually flood Israel, destroying it demographically and democratically.
For Abbas, the PLO and the P.A., the refugees are a political tool, used to maintain pressure on Israel. Accordingly, in the eyes of the Palestinian leadership, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) is nothing more than a “political symbol of the right of return” whose focus is political, not humanitarian.
While the idea that Israel agrees to commit national suicide or pay billions of dollars of “compensation” to the refugees has never been viable, Abbas’s intransigence on the subject has cost many of the refugees their lives. In 2012, as the Syrian civil war raged, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu offered that the “Palestinian refugees” resident in Syria be given safe haven in Yehuda and Shomron. His sole condition was that those who settled in the area waived their refugee status. Abbas rejected the offer, preferring to leave the embattled refugees to their deadly fate in Syria.
While the international community has provided billions of dollars to maintain UNRWA, no refugees have actually been resettled. While the United Nations initially recognized that the number of Palestinian refugees was no more than 711,000 people, by the end of 2018, UNRWA claimed there were 5,442,947 “refugees.” Six years later, as of the end of the second quarter of 2024, UNRWA claimed the number of refugees had grown by more than 550,000 to 5,975,959.
This reality brought President-elect Trump, during his first term in September 2018, to cease all U.S. funding to UNRWA, claiming that the Agency was an “irredeemably flawed operation.”
If Abbas truly desires peace, he must accept that it is time to relinquish the illusion that the Palestinian “refugees” will eventually flood and destroy Israel, thereby allowing for their resettlement in their host countries.
- Clarify Who He Represents And What Authority He Has.
Before Abbas can speak in the name of the Palestinians, he first needs to clarify who he represents and what authority he holds. In the mid 1970s the United Nations recognized the PLO as the representative of the Palestinian people. The decision was made in the absence of any other potential representative, and the recognition was predominantly declarative and theoretical. In the 50 years that have passed since, many things have changed. These developments must be clarified.
While the United Nations may have recognized the PLO as the representative of the Palestinians, surveys conducted by the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research (PCPSR) show that the Palestinians themselves no longer support that decision.
According to PCPSR studies, in 2006, 69% of Palestinians saw the PLO as their sole representative; that support dwindled to 58% in 2018, 54% in 2019 and to only 51% in 2022. When the PCPSR asked the Palestinians in April 2024 who they thought was “the most deserving of representing the Palestinian people,” 49% expressed support for Hamas, the internationally designated terrorist organization that led the Oct. 7 massacre. Only 17% expressed support for Fatah, led by Abbas.
Clarifying who Abbas represents and what authority he holds is fundamental to avoiding mistakes of the past.
As a precondition to signing the Oslo Accords, PLO leader Yasser Arafat committed to amending the PLO Charter and removing all statements therein calling for the destruction of Israel. This commitment, like many others given by Arafat, proved to be empty. Five years after the signing of the initial agreement, U.S. President Bill Clinton travelled to Gaza to ostensibly watch the vote to amend the Charter. In reality, the charter was never amended.
The PLO itself is also problematic. Established in 1964, the PLO is a conglomerate of Palestinian factions, some of which, such as the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), are internationally designated terror organizations.
The PFLP, among other PLO bodies, never accepted the Oslo Accords, and categorically refuses to accept the existence of Israel. Abbas, similar to his predecessor Arafat, has refused to take any actions to expel the PFLP or other rejectionist factions from the PLO or even denounce their actions.
Within the P.A., Abbas last stood for election in 2005. Those elections were boycotted by Hamas. According to the P.A. Central Elections Committee, of the 1,760,481 potential voters, only 802,077 cast their ballots. Abbas won less than two-thirds of these votes. From the outset, Abbas was an unpopular leader lacking any real support or legitimacy.
Recognizing that the PLO was no longer relevant for the United States. During Trump’s first term, in 2018 the State Department concluded that the “PLO had failed to use its Washington office to engage in direct and meaningful negotiations on achieving a comprehensive peace settlement and, therefore, closing the PLO’s Washington office would serve the foreign policy interests of the United States.” (Legal opinion of the U.S. State Department, “Statutory Restrictions on the PLO’s Washington Office”, Sept. 11, 2018.)
Even under President Biden, the PLO’s office in Washington was not reopened.
Abbas, now 89 years old, freely declares his willingness to promote peace, but the critical question that must be asked is what authority he, personally, or the organization he heads, the PLO, actually holds to make commitments in the name of the Palestinians.
Lt. Col. (res.) Maurice Hirsch is the director of the Initiative for Palestinian Authority Accountability and Reform in the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs; a senior legal analyst for Human Rights Voices; and a member of the Israel Defense and Security Forum.
