Anti-Israel NGO Admits: Palestinian Children Commit Terror for ‘Status’

The program director for Defence for Children International-Palestine (DCI-P), a Palestinian NGO, admitted in an interview that Palestinian minors commit terror attacks to enhance their societal status. The admission contradicts DCI-P’s propaganda, which is often disseminated by an uncritical press.

Ayed Abu Qteish, DCI-P’s accountability program director, acknowledged as much in an Oct. 11, 2017 interview on the show Personal Encounter, which is broadcast on official Palestinian Authority (PA) TV. Palestinian Media Watch (PMW), a non-profit organization that monitors Arab media in the West Bank (Judea and Samaria), the Gaza Strip and eastern Jerusalem, translated Qteish’s remarks:

“There are children who, when they were in prison, told the lawyer: ‘I want to be imprisoned.’ The first time [the child] was imprisoned, he didn’t confess, and they released him because there was no evidence to convict him in the Israeli military court. The second time, there was no evidence either. The third time, he wanted to be imprisoned so that his image wont be hurt in the eyes of his friends, even though he is actually innocent…In several cases [Palestinian children] carried out stabbing operations because of the way the public looks at them. They realized ‘the best way to clear myself of this image [of helping Israel] is to participate in the resistance operations [emphasis added].’”

As CAMERA has noted, “resistance operations” is a euphemism for committing terrorist attacks.

PMW pointed out that DCI-P “has unjustifiably been accusing Israel of breaching the rights of Palestinian minors who are arrested on suspicion of committing terror attacks.” PMW noted that Oteish’s admission is significant because “in stark contrast to the claims of DCI-P in its campaign, it demonstrates that when Palestinian minors are arrested but the investigation ends without finding sufficient evidence, the suspect is released.” Put simply: Oteish’s interview highlights the hollowness of DCI-P’s claims.

According to NGO Monitor, an organization that monitors non-governmental groups that are active in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, DCI-P supports the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement (BDS), which seeks to delegitimize Israel and calls for its ends as a Jewish state.

DCI-P also has ties to the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), a U.S.-designated terrorist group. In its report on the non-profit, NGO Monitor noted that Shawan Jabarin, “an alleged PFLP activist” was a member of DCI-P’s board, as were alleged PFLP affiliates Nassar Ibrahim and Dr. Majed Nasser. The board’s secretary Fatima Daana is the widow of Raed Nazzal, the former commander of PFLP’s Abu Ali Mustafa Brigades. One DCI-P employee, Hashem Abu Maria, was celebrated by the PFLP as a “commander” after his death in 2014.

Yet, as CAMERA highlighted in a June 15, 2016 Washington Jewish Week Op-Ed, the media and policymakers frequently omit DCI-P’s anti-Israel agenda and links to the PFLP (“The Greatest Threat to Palestinian Arab Youth”). The New York Times, The Hill, and others have all broadcast DCI-P’s claims, but failed to provide essential background about the organization and its aims.