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If Mahmoud Abbas Won’t Condemn Oct. 7, the UN Should Not Meet With Him
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas addresses the 79th United Nations General Assembly at United Nations headquarters in New York, US, Sept. 26, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Brendan McDermid
As Western leaders plan to meet at the UN on June 17 to possibly give Palestinian Authority (PA) leader Mahmoud Abbas recognition of a Palestinian state, Abbas continues to prove how unworthy the PA is of being a state. Abbas and the PA’s continued embrace of Oct. 7, 2023, show that the PA remains a terror-supporting entity, diametrically opposed to the values of the very countries that plan to recognize a Palestinian state.
Abbas has reminded us once again that if the PA were to become a state, it would be a terror state.
Last Sunday, the PA’s official daily published an interview that Abbas gave in August 2024, which included the straightforward question of how Abbas views the Oct. 7 atrocities. It turns out that the brutal murders, rape, torture and kidnappings are not atrocities at all from Abbas’ perspective, but rather Hamas’ attempt to achieve “important goals” which embarrassed Israel and showed its weaknesses.
Abbas defined Oct. 7 by listing the “important goals” that Hamas achieved:
- Hamas “killed 1,200 Israelis, abducted 250 others, and took them as hostages. This attack shook the foundations of the Israeli entity”;
- Hamas “exposed the [false] claims that … [Israel] has an invincible army”;
- Hamas exposed the “glaring failure of this entity’s [i.e., Israel’s] components, especially the army and the various security forces”; and
- The “entity” failed “to discover what Hamas was planning, and failed to block the attack and prevent heavy losses”[Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, June 1, 2025]
However, according to Abbas, there was one problem with Hamas’ achieving these “important goals”: they were not equal to the devastation that Hamas brought on Gaza:
As important as the goals that Hamas attempted to achieve through this attack may have been, they are not comparable to the damages and heavy losses that the Gaza Strip, its residents, and the Palestinian cause have suffered …
Without absolving the hated Israeli occupation of the primary responsibility for the destruction of the Gaza Strip, Hamas provided this occupation [i.e., Israel] with the excuses to do what it did: genocide and war crimes against our people.
[Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, June 1, 2025]
The publication of Abbas’ interview lauding Hamas’ accomplishments comes shortly after an interview given by Abbas’ senior advisor, Mahmoud Al-Habbash, who defended the Oct. 7 atrocities as “legitimate resistance,” five times in one interview:
Al-Habbash: “What Hamas carried out on Oct. 7, I start from the assumption that resistance is legitimate. We agreed from the start that the resistance is legitimate, and no one can dispute the legitimacy of the resistance … What happened on Oct. 7 is a legitimate thing, okay? It’s legitimate.” [emphasis added]
Abbas’ interview and his advisor’s recent defense of Oct. 7 must serve as a wake-up call for all Western countries that plan to attend the UN event later this month.
To his people in Arabic, Mahmoud Abbas remains a terror-supporting leader. When he meets world leaders, he continues his years of deception.
Palestinian Media Watch calls on France and Saudi Arabia — the sponsors of the June 17 UN event — to condemn Mahmoud Abbas’ support for Oct. 7, and demand that Abbas retract this statement and publicly condemn the Oct. 7 massacre in Arabic on official PA TV, in the official PA daily, through the official PA news agency WAFA, and in mainstream and popular Arabic media.
If Abbas refuses to condemn the Oct. 7 atrocities, there is no justification for the June 17 UN event, and it should be cancelled.
The author is the Founder and Director of Palestinian Media Watch, where a version of this article first appeared.
The post If Mahmoud Abbas Won’t Condemn Oct. 7, the UN Should Not Meet With Him first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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After False Dawns, Gazans Hope Trump Will Force End to Two-Year-Old War
Palestinians walk past a residential building destroyed in previous Israeli strikes, after Hamas agreed to release hostages and accept some other terms in a US plan to end the war, in Nuseirat, central Gaza Strip October 4, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Mahmoud Issa
Exhausted Palestinians in Gaza clung to hopes on Saturday that US President Donald Trump would keep up pressure on Israel to end a two-year-old war that has killed tens of thousands and displaced the entire population of more than two million.
Hamas’ declaration that it was ready to hand over hostages and accept some terms of Trump’s plan to end the conflict while calling for more talks on several key issues was greeted with relief in the enclave, where most homes are now in ruins.
“It’s happy news, it saves those who are still alive,” said 32-year-old Saoud Qarneyta, reacting to Hamas’ response and Trump’s intervention. “This is enough. Houses have been damaged, everything has been damaged, what is left? Nothing.”
GAZAN RESIDENT HOPES ‘WE WILL BE DONE WITH WARS’
Ismail Zayda, 40, a father of three, displaced from a suburb in northern Gaza City where Israel launched a full-scale ground operation last month, said: “We want President Trump to keep pushing for an end to the war, if this chance is lost, it means that Gaza City will be destroyed by Israel and we might not survive.
“Enough, two years of bombardment, death and starvation. Enough,” he told Reuters on a social media chat.
“God willing this will be the last war. We will hopefully be done with the wars,” said 59-year-old Ali Ahmad, speaking in one of the tented camps where most Palestinians now live.
“We urge all sides not to backtrack. Every day of delay costs lives in Gaza, it is not just time wasted, lives get wasted too,” said Tamer Al-Burai, a Gaza City businessman displaced with members of his family in central Gaza Strip.
After two previous ceasefires — one near the start of the war and another earlier this year — lasted only a few weeks, he said; “I am very optimistic this time, maybe Trump’s seeking to be remembered as a man of peace, will bring us real peace this time.”
RESIDENT WORRIES THAT NETANYAHU WILL ‘SABOTAGE’ DEAL
Some voiced hopes of returning to their homes, but the Israeli military issued a fresh warning to Gazans on Saturday to stay out of Gaza City, describing it as a “dangerous combat zone.”
Gazans have faced previous false dawns during the past two years, when Trump and others declared at several points during on-off negotiations between Hamas, Israel and Arab and US mediators that a deal was close, only for war to rage on.
“Will it happen? Can we trust Trump? Maybe we trust Trump, but will Netanyahu abide this time? He has always sabotaged everything and continued the war. I hope he ends it now,” said Aya, 31, who was displaced with her family to Deir Al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip.
She added: “Maybe there is a chance the war ends at October 7, two years after it began.”
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Mass Rally in Rome on Fourth Day of Italy’s Pro-Palestinian Protests
A Pro-Palestinian demonstrator waves a Palestinian flag during a national protest for Gaza in Rome, Italy, October 4, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Claudia Greco
Large crowds assembled in central Rome on Saturday for the fourth straight day of protests in Italy since Israel intercepted an international flotilla trying to deliver aid to Gaza, and detained its activists.
People holding banners and Palestinian flags, chanting “Free Palestine” and other slogans, filed past the Colosseum, taking part in a march that organizers hoped would attract at least 1 million people.
“I’m here with a lot of other friends because I think it is important for us all to mobilize individually,” Francesco Galtieri, a 65-year-old musician from Rome, said. “If we don’t all mobilize, then nothing will change.”
Since Israel started blocking the flotilla late on Wednesday, protests have sprung up across Europe and in other parts of the world, but in Italy they have been a daily occurrence, in multiple cities.
On Friday, unions called a general strike in support of the flotilla, with demonstrations across the country that attracted more than 2 million, according to organizers. The interior ministry estimated attendance at around 400,000.
Italy’s right-wing government has been critical of the protests, with Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni suggesting that people would skip work for Gaza just as an excuse for a longer weekend break.
On Saturday, Meloni blamed protesters for insulting graffiti that appeared on a statue of the late Pope John Paul II outside Rome’s main train station, where Pro-Palestinian groups have been holding a protest picket.
“They say they are taking to the streets for peace, but then they insult the memory of a man who was a true defender and builder of peace. A shameful act committed by people blinded by ideology,” she said in a statement.
Israel launched its Gaza offensive after Hamas terrorists staged a cross border attack on October 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people and taking 251 people hostage.
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Hamas Says It Agrees to Release All Israeli Hostages Under Trump Gaza Plan
Smoke rises during an Israeli military operation in Gaza City, as seen from the central Gaza Strip, October 2, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Dawoud Abu Alkas
Hamas said on Friday it had agreed to release all Israeli hostages, alive or dead, under the terms of US President Donald Trump’s Gaza proposal, and signaled readiness to immediately enter mediated negotiations to discuss the details.