By KOBY GOULDWorld leaders including Netanyahu and Abbas flank French Presdient Francois Hollande at Paris solidarity rally(photo credit: REUTERS)I am very uncomfortable seeing Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas in Paris with French President Francois Hollande today - I appreciate that he's damned if he does and damned if he doesn't, that if he hadn't gone, he'd have been accused of not giving a damn about what happened but seeing Abbas, a hypocritical, duplicitous man, at the anti-racist, anti-anti-Semitic, anti-terrorist, pro-democracy, pro-human/civil rights rally, it sickens me!! He is part of the problem, NOT part of the solution! His partner, out of choice, is Hamas!! The values which the rally reflect, democracy and freedom, human and civil rights, Rule of Law, values which those at the rally hold dear and espouse, they are NOT values espoused by Mahmoud Abbas. He and Hamas oversee the opposite value system in Judea/Samaria and Gaza. The man has a disgusting history of Holocaust denial/revisionism and that alone makes him wholly unwelcome.He's the President of the PA and, as such, I believe that Israel should maintain lines of communication and relations with him but I find his presence at the rally abhorrent.That said, I'm not 100% sure if I'm right. He has a choice, either to attend the rally or not to attend and as not attending would send out a very negative and counter productive signal, I guess he has to attend. I believe in the old adage, that one makes peace with one's enemies, not with one's friends and, in that respect, however we feel about Mahmoud Abbas, it's better for Israel to talk to the PA, even with his leadership and in partnership with Hamas, that to cut off all communications. Following on from that, if the organizers of the Paris rally were to disenfranchise Abbas, it would defeat the purpose somewhat, that purpose being to bring people together.I guess that, as one who believes in keeping open lines of communication between Israel and the PA, as one who won't let go of hope, as one who does NOT look at the issue as Islam against the rest of the world but as radical, extremist Islam (and is that even Islam?) against the rest of the world, I have to be ok with Mahmoud Abbas attending the rally. I believe in talking, discussing, opening doors, keeping them open and I guess that has to extend to accepting the presence of Mahmoud Abbas at the Paris rally.
