"They want to fight our existence, to fight our human feeling. They want to fight against our future and don't want us to have a future."
By AARON REICHCannabis plants seized by Israeli Police(photo credit: MAARIV)
In what is part of an ongoing story in Palestinian media, PA President Mahmoud Abbas accused Israel of smuggling cannabis and other drugs to Palestinians because "they don't want us to have a future," Palestinian Media Watch (PMW) reported.Speaking at an international conference on corruption, Abbas discussed the corruption plaguing Palestinian society."We know that we will not be able to uproot the slice of corruption here for many reasons, but there is an important reason, and it is the occupation," he said."The occupation plants corruption among us, aids the corrupt and the corrupters, encourages the corrupt and the corrupters and if we do not have [them], it brings us corrupt people and corrupters," Abbas continued, adding: "And therefore, we see substances like cannabis and drugs, etc."This, he explained, is "because they want to fight our existence, to fight our human feeling. They want to fight against our future and don't want us to have a future."Abbas added, however, that the occupation isn't to blame for corruption being present to begin with."Indeed, even without the occupation, this corruption exists among us, and we must continue to fight it until the end, and it does not matter who stands behind it."The story of Israel bringing drugs to the Palestinians is nothing new in Palestinian media.In an op-ed written by Muwaffaq Matar in the official PA daily paper Al-Hayat Al-Jadida on December 12, it was alleged that IDF soldiers want Palestinian children to hold needles rather than books or pens. This is because "drug needles kill the soul and lead the users to a stage of helplessness.”
The op-ed continued, stating that the IDF ignores drug dealers at the gates of Palestinian schools, and are in fact Israeli pawns.In another instance in August 2018, PLO official Nasser Nimr Ayyad alleged in Al-Hayat Al-Jadida that Israel has worked to "flood the Palestinian street with drugs."Earlier that same month, after it was discovered that there were marijuana fields near Jenin, PA Preventive Security Force head Muhannad Abu Ali explicitly blamed Israel for it, according to Al-Hayat Al-Jadida.Speaking on PA TV in January 2018, Abbas also accused Israel of exporting drugs to Palestinians.
