I RECENTLY received an email from a Jewish friend of mine who has a chilling personal connection to a horrific event that took place 32 years ago in Israel -- a ruthless, murderous rampage by a gang of Palestinian terrorists led by a 19-year-old Palestinian girl named Dalal Mughrabi. In all, 38 innocent men, women and children were massacred that day in the deadliest terrorist attack in Israel's history.

Last week, the Palestinian Authority commemorated -- actually celebrated -- the anniversary of that unspeakably evil act by naming a public square in Mughrabi's honor.

My friend said in his email message that on March 11, 1978, three months before his wedding, his bride-to-be was "headed home ... taking a bus on the main freeway between Tel Aviv and Haifa. Much blood would be shed on that Freeway on that evening." It goes without saying that if the terrorists had hijacked a different bus on that road that day, my friend's fiancé may well have been among the victims.

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On March 17, 2010, the Los Angeles Times published an opinion piece entitled "Why glorify the murderers," written by Ron Kehrmann, Yossi Mendelevich and Yossi Zur, which my friend forwarded to me. The authors each had children who were victims of another more recent Palestinian terrorist attack on Israeli civilians. "Seven years ago this month, on March 5, 2003, our children were killed by a Palestinian suicide murderer who exploded the bomb he was carrying on a city bus in Haifa. Seventeen people, mostly children on their way home from school, were killed," they wrote.

The authors noted that during the week if March 7, 2010, when Vice President Joe Biden was visiting Israel, he "took umbrage" at an announcement that the Israeli government had approved construction of new housing in East Jerusalem. But Biden had no criticism of the Palestinian Authority for naming a public square in a town outside Ramallah in Dalal Mughrabi's honor during his visit. Mugrabi had already been "commemorated in Hebron, where a girls school is named after her."

According to the article, Mughrabi and her squad "entered Israel by boat from Lebanon" with "one intent: to kill Israelis, randomly, as many as possible." The first person they encountered was an American photojournalist, Gale Rubin, who was "taking photos of birds near the beach. They killed her and continued on their deadly path."

Making their way to the main highway to Tel Aviv, they "hijacked a bus full of happy families returning from a Saturday excursion." From the bus, "the terrorist shot at passing cars and killed more innocent people," and "when Israeli security forces stopped the bus, the terrorists ran out while throwing hand grenades into the bus, setting it on fire." Those inside were burned alive.

"We don't believe people who murder children should be held up as heroes," wrote Kehrmann and his colleagues.

Asking how a society can have so many young people willing to blow themselves up in order to kill Israeli civilians, they then wrote: "The answers are rooted in years of glorifying the murderers, putting their posters on the streets, giving their families money and respect, and yes, in naming city squares after them."

In most countries, anyone who committed the atrocious acts that Mughrabi carried out "would be condemned for eternity," they wrote. But "in today's Palestinian society" she is regarded as a heroine. "As long as Palestinian society glorifies terrorists and murderers such as Mughrabi and the ones who killed our three children, we cannot believe that Palestinians are ready to live in peace with us."

Source: www.PerspicacityPress.com. Copyright © 2010 by Rand Green Communications.
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