2016 was a tough year for the Palestinians. It was tough not only for those Palestinians living in the West Bank under the Palestinian Authority (PA) regime, or the Gaza Strip under Hamas. When Westerners hear about the “plight” and “suffering” of Palestinians, they instantly assume that the talk is about those living in the West Bank or Gaza Strip. Rarely does the international community hear about what is happening to Palestinians in the Arab countries. This lapse doubtless exists because the misery of Palestinians in the Arab countries is difficult to pin on Israel.

The international community and mainstream journalists only know of those Palestinians living in the West Bank or the Gaza Strip. Of course, life under the Palestinian Authority and Hamas is no box of dates, although this inconvenient fact might be rather unpleasant to the ears of Western journalists and human rights organizations.

In any event, mainstream media outlets seem to prefer turning a blind eye to the plight of Palestinians living in Arab countries. This evasion harms first and foremost the Palestinians themselves and allows Arab governments to continue their policies of persecution and repression.

The past few years have seen horror stories about the conditions of Palestinians in Syria. Where is the media attention for the Palestinians in this war-stricken country? Palestinians in Syria are being murdered, tortured, imprisoned and displaced. The West yawns.

Foreign journalists covering the Middle East swarm by the hundreds throughout Jerusalem and Tel Aviv. Yet they act as if Palestinians can only be found in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. These journalists have no desire to go to Syria or other Arab countries to report about the mistreatment and trespasses perpetrated by Arabs against their Palestinian brothers. For these journalists, Arabs killing and torturing other Arabs is not news. But when Israeli policemen shoot and kill a Palestinian terrorist who rams his truck into a group of soldiers and kills and wounds them, Western reporters rush to visit his family’s home to interview them and provide them with a platform to express their thoughts.

Palestinians living in Syria, however, are less fortunate. No one is asking how they feel about the devastation of their families, communities and lives. Especially not the hundreds of Middle East correspondents working in the region.

“The year 2016 was full of all forms of killings, torture and displacement of Palestinians in Syria,” according to recent reports published in a number of Arab media outlets.

“The last year was hell for these Palestinians and its harsh consequences will not be erased for many years to come. During 2016, Palestinians in Syria were subjected to the cruelest forms of torture and deprivation at the hands armed gangs and the ruling Syrian regime. It is hard to find one Palestinian family in Syria that has not been affected.”

According to the reports, Syrian authorities are withholding the bodies of more than 456 Palestinians who died under torture in prison. No one knows exactly where the bodies are being held or why the Syrian authorities are refusing to hand them over to the relatives.

Even more disturbing are reports suggesting that Syrian authorities have been harvesting the organs of dead Palestinians. Testimonies collected by some Palestinians point to a Syrian government-linked gang that has been trading in the organs of the victims, who include women and children. Another 1,100 Palestinians have been languishing in Syrian prisons since the beginning of the war, more than five years ago. The Syrian authorities do not provide any statistics about the number of prisoners and detainees; nor do they allow human rights groups or the International Committee of the Red Cross to visit prisons and detention centers.

The most recent report about the plight of Palestinians in Syria states that 3,420 Palestinians (455 of them females) have been killed since the beginning of the war. The report, published by the Action Group For Palestinians of Syria, also reveals that nearly 80,000 Palestinians have fled to Europe, while 31,000 fled to Lebanon, 17,000 to Jordan, 6,000 to Egypt, 8,000 to Turkey and 1,000 to the Gaza Strip. The report also mentions that 190 Palestinians died as a result of malnutrition and lack of medical care because their refugee camps and villages are under siege by the Syrian army and armed groups.

Palestinians flee Yarmouk refugee camp, near Damascus, after fierce fighting in September 2015. (Image source: RT video screenshot)

Alarmed by the indifference of the international community to their plight, Palestinians in Syria have resorted to social media to be heard in the hope that decision-makers in the West or the UN Security Council, obsessed as they are with Israeli settlements, might pay attention to their suffering. The latest campaign on social media, entitled, “Where are the detainees?” refers to the unknown fate of those Palestinians who have gone missing after being taken into custody by Syrian authorities. The organizers of the campaign revealed that in the past few years, 54 Palestinian minors have died under torture in Syrian prisons. The organizers noted that hundreds of prisoners and detainees, after they were apprehended by the Syrian authorities, remain unaccounted for.

Another report revealed that more than 80% of the Palestinians living in Syria have lost their jobs and businesses since the beginning of the civil war. The report added that to support their families, many Palestinian children have been forced to quit school and search for work.

Yet to the international community and Western media, these figures and reports about the Palestinians in Syria are ho-hum at best. The Arab countries care nothing about the Palestinians in Syria who are being killed, tortured and starved to death. In the Arab world, human rights violations are not news. When human rights are respected in an Arab country, that is news.

The Palestinian leadership in the West Bank and Gaza Strip are also blind to the suffering of their people in the Arab world, specifically in Syria. These so-called leaders are too busy ripping out each other’s political throats to be bothered with the welfare of their people, being smothered under the undemocratic and repressive regimes of the Palestinian Authority and Hamas. Such leaders are more concerned about President Donald Trump’s intention to the move the US embassy to Jerusalem than about their own people. In the past two weeks, Mahmoud Abbas and his officials have not missed an opportunity to warn that moving the US embassy to Jerusalem would spark unrest in the Middle East. The killing, torture and displacement of Palestinians in an Arab country seem not to be on their radar.

It remains to be seen whether the UN Security Council will get its priorities straight and hold an emergency session to discuss the murderous campaign against Palestinians in Syria. Perhaps, somehow, this will overtake “settlement construction” as a topic worthy of world condemnation.

Khaled Abu Toameh, an award-winning journalist, is based in Jerusalem.

Talk about a confederation between the Palestinians and Jordan has once again resurfaced, this time after a series of unofficial meetings in Amman and the West Bank in the past few weeks. Jordan, fearing that such confederation would end up with the Hashemite kingdom transformed into a Palestinian state, is not currently keen on the idea.

Many Palestinians have also expressed reservations about the idea. They argue that a confederation could harm their effort to establish an independent Palestinian state in the West Bank, East Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip.

The confederation talk returned during a recent high-profile visit to the West Bank by former Jordanian Prime Minister Abdel Salam Majali. During a meeting with representatives of large Palestinian clans in Nablus, Majali voiced his support for the confederation idea, saying it was the “best solution for both Palestinians and Jordanians.”

The former Jordanian prime minister told some 100 Palestinians who gathered to greet him in Nablus, the largest Palestinian city in the West Bank: “Jordan cannot live without Palestine and Palestine cannot live without Jordan.” Stressing that such a confederation should be created after the establishment of an independent Palestinian state, Majali said that the confederation would mean that Palestinians and Jordanians would have a joint government and parliament.

In a rare moment of truth, Majali admitted that the Palestinians were not “fully qualified to assume their responsibilities, especially in the financial field, in wake of the failure of the Arab countries to support them.” So Majali is basically telling the Palestinians: “You can’t rely on your Arab brothers to help you build a state. Jordan is the only Arab country that cares about you.”

Some Jordanians said this week that Majali was speaking only on his behalf and that his views did not represent those of Jordan’s King Abdullah or the government. They pointed out that the last time Majali met with the monarch was four months ago, when King Abdullah visited him in the hospital where Majali was being treated.

Still, it is hard to believe that such a senior figure as Majali would have advocated the confederation plan without having first received some kind of green light from the royal palace in Amman.

Let us remember that Jordan has a history on this issue. In 1988, the late King Hussein “divorced” the West Bank, announcing that the kingdom was cutting its administrative and legal ties to the territory that had been under its control until 1967. Of course, the king had good reason to renounce any claim to the West Bank: the First Intifada had just begun and the Palestinians in the West Bank were considered “troublemakers” that he did not need in his Palestinian-majority kingdom.

Thus we see why many Jordanians remain opposed to the confederation idea. A study published in 2014 shows that the Jordanian public was against the idea.

According to the study, the Jordanian public is totally opposed to the idea, even after the establishment of an independent Palestinian state in the West Bank, Gaza Strip and east Jerusalem. The Jordanians fear, among other things, that the confederation would lead to the “dilution” of the Jordanian identity, create instability and undermine security in the kingdom.

Jordanian columnist and political analyst Fahd Khitan echoed this fear by declaring that the confederation idea “means suicide for the Hashemite kingdom.” Noting that many Palestinians were also opposed to the idea, even after the establishment of an independent Palestinian state, Khitan said that mutual confidence between the Palestinians and Jordanians has deteriorated, particularly in wake of the recent controversy over the installment of security cameras at the Temple Mount in Jerusalem.

Under a U.S.-brokered plan, the Jordanian government was supposed to install the cameras at the holy site as a way of easing tensions between Palestinians and Israel. The controversy had erupted over Jewish visits to the Temple Mount. However, the Jordanians were forced a few weeks ago to abandon the plan after Palestinian opposition and threats. The Palestinians claimed that Israel would use the cameras to arrest Palestinians who are stationed at the Temple Mount with the mission of harassing Jewish visitors.

“The Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip are not just residents who can be incorporated into this or that country,” Khitan explained in his rejection of the confederation idea. “The Palestinians are a people who have their own land and Jordan is a country that is now celebrating its 70th anniversary.” So this Jordanian analyst is telling the Palestinians: “We love you and you are wonderful people, but we prefer that you stay away from us.”

While most Jordanians seem to be strongly opposed to the idea of adding another three or four million Palestinians to the kingdom’s population, Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip appear to be divided over the idea.

The Palestinian Authority (PA) leadership, which by all accounts has failed to lead its people towards statehood because of its incompetence and corruption, has yet to spell out its position regarding the proposed confederation with Jordan.

There are, however, signs that a growing number of Palestinians are beginning to entertain the idea of being part of Jordan. A recent public opinion poll published by An-Najah University in Nablus found that 42% of Palestinians favor the confederation idea. The poll also found that 59% of Palestinians do not believe that a Palestinian state would be established within the pre-1967 lines.

This means that a majority of Palestinians have lost confidence in their leaders’ ability to achieve an independent Palestinian state. One of the main reasons is the ongoing power struggle between the PA and Hamas. It is a conflict that has divided the Palestinians into two separate cultural as well as geographic entities, in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. The reality on the ground is that the two-state solution has already been fulfilled: in the end, the Palestinians got two mini-states of their own — one governed by the Palestinian Authority and the second by Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

Another sign of growing Palestinian support for the idea can be found in the Hebron area, where leaders of large clans have also begun campaigning for the implementation of a confederation with Jordan. It is estimated that nearly one million Hebronites live in Jordan and the West Bank, and this statistic is also driving support for the idea.

In recent weeks, several Hebron clan leaders visited Jordan as part of an effort to muster popular support for the confederation idea. A prominent member of the Jordanian parliament, Dr. Mohammed al-Dawaymeh, lately visited Hebron, where he met with the heads of the city’s large clans to promote the idea. Again, it is unlikely that the member of parliament was acting without the backing of King Abdullah or the Jordanian government. But his visit to the West Bank, like that of Majali before him, has sparked a new wave of speculation among Palestinians that something is being “cooked up” to enable the confederation plan to take place.

What is notable is that the confederation idea seems to be gaining support among Palestinian clans in a society that is largely a tribal one. Both Hebron and Nablus consist of large clans, and it makes sense that the two senior Jordanian figures chose to concentrate their efforts there. If you manage to convince the clans to support the idea, that approval, they believe, would create pressure on the Palestinian leaders to follow suit.

Also intriguing is that some prominent Palestinians seem to have endorsed the confederation idea — again due to their having lost confidence in their leaders’ ability to move forward and bring them a better life.

It is unlikely that prominent Jordanian politicians, who have recently talked about a confederation between the Palestinians and Jordan, are acting without the backing of King Abdullah (left). Meanwhile, a majority of Palestinians have seemingly lost confidence in the ability of their leaders, such as PA President Mahmoud Abbas (right), to achieve an independent Palestinian state. (Image source: Abdullah: World Bank / Abbas: US State Dept.)

Two of these Palestinians are Ghassan Shaka’ah, a former mayor of Nablus and a prominent PLO leader in the West Bank, and Professor Sari Nusseibeh, a respected pragmatic academic and former president of Al-Quds University.

The renewed talk about a confederation between the Palestinians and Jordan underscores the Palestinian leadership’s failure to convince many Palestinians of its ability to lead them towards statehood. It is also a sign of the revival of the role of Palestinians clans in the Palestinian political arena. For the past two decades, the power of the clans has been undermined, thanks to the presence of central governments — the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank and Hamas in the Gaza Strip. But the weakness of these two governments has prompted clan leaders to take matters into their hands and renew talk about a confederation with Jordan.

A confederation between the Palestinians and Jordan may seem to be a good idea in the long term. But for now, it is hard to see how Jordanian leader would agree to turn millions of Palestinians into citizens of the kingdom. It is also hard to see Jordanians agreeing to absorb either Hamas or the Palestinian Authority and share power with them. Still, the talk about a confederation between the Palestinians and Jordan shows that under the current circumstances, the two-state solution (a Palestinian state alongside Israel) is no longer being viewed by Palestinians as a realistic solution that will bring their people a better life.

Jordan is not the only Arab country that does not consider the Palestinians trustworthy partners. The Jordanians still have painful memories from the early 1970s, when the PLO and other Palestinian groups tried to establish a state within a state inside the kingdom, and thus threatened Jordan’s security and stability. Today, there is only one solution: maintain the status quo until Palestinian leaders wake up and start working to improve the living conditions of their people and prepare them for peace with Israel.

Khaled Abu Toameh, an award-winning journalist is based in Jerusalem.

The sport of murdering Jews does not stop. On June 30, at dawn, in Kiryat Arba, a young Arab broke through a window, and stabbed a 13-year-old American-Israeli girl, Hallel Yaffa Ariel, to death.

The young Arab who stabbed Hallel Yaffa Ariel was shot dead just after the assault. His mother said she was proud of her son. The Palestinian Authority (PA) said he was a hero and a “martyr.”

This year alone, 24 Israeli Jews were murdered, many gruesomely. Every time one of the murderers was shot, his family declared how proud they were, and the Palestinian Authority celebrated him. New murderers are preparing new attacks.

What sort of society is it where parents say they how proud they are that their children are murderers? And what sort of leadership is it that celebrates killers?

Further, what sort of Western journalists and “human rights” groups are those that fail to voice their outrage at the murder of a sleeping 13-year-old girl?

These journalists and human rights groups voice their outrage at people killed in European soccer stadiums, musical theaters and editorial rooms, but never, it seems, for Israeli Jews killed over so many years.

Why also is it that they never speak of the moral depravity of the Palestinian Authority?

Most remain silent; many do worse. They blame the victims, accuse them of being the guilty party. Some even justify the murders and find excuses for the terrorists. Sometimes, when the murders take place in disputed areas such as Judea and Samaria, these self-appointed judges call the victims “settlers,” and claim that they deserved their death for being where they should not have been. They comfortably overlook that to many Palestinians, all the Jews are “settlers,” even the ones they kill in Tel Aviv. Just look at any map of “Palestine” — on every one, the whole of Israel is a “settlement.”. If there were no “settlements” until after 1967, but the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) was created in 1964, what was it planning to “liberate”?

Most Western journalists instead explain that “violence” is the fatal result of the “hopelessness” created by the Israeli government. Did they ever say that about the murders in Paris’s theaters, London’s Underground, New York’s office buildings, Madrid’s train system or Dakha’s restaurant — that they were the result of “hopelessness”?

None of these journalists ever reports the reactions of those murderers’ families.

And almost none of them ever reports what the Palestinian Authority does after each Palestinian bombing, stabbing, car-rammming or other murderous attacks — how it rewards the terrorists and urges more attacks.

Most Western politicians, Europeans in particular, are no different. They half-heartedly condemn the murderers and then blame Israel’s government. On June 30th, the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs published a press release saying that “France condemns the horrific murder of a young Israeli girl in the settlement of Kiryat Arba in the West Bank,” and asking “all the parties to do everything possible to calm the situation.”

The same day, Lars Faaborg-Andersen, the head of the European Union’s delegation in Israel, wrote, “Strongly condemn terror murder of Hallel Yaffa Ariel in Kiryat Arba this morning.” Four days later, the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs published another press release:

“France condemns the Israeli authorities’ approval of plans to build several hundred homes in settlements… each new announcement of settlement activity, which is illegal under international law, fuels tensions.”

On July 5th, a spokesperson for the EU said:

“Despite repeated calls by the international community Israel is continuing its settlement policy, which is illegal under international law. The decision calls into question Israel’s commitment to a negotiated agreement with the Palestinians.”

None of them ever mentions the reactions of the murderers’ families either, or the behavior of the Palestinian Authority. That way, they can express sympathy for the “Palestinian cause” without having to grapple publicly with tough questions or embarrassing facts.

For instance, the Palestinian Authority not only celebrates murderers: it produces new ones every day — and does so knowingly and voluntarily. For this it uses textbooks, television and radio programs, and articles in newspapers, all paid for with money from Western governments.

The Palestinian Authority also financially rewards the murderers’ families and the murderers themselves, if they survive and end up in jail. These financial rewards are also paid for with money from Western governments.

How can Western politicians explain that they condemn the murders and still fund the incitement to kill? How come they keep giving money that rewards murdering Jews “by all available means“?

How can they say, as they so often do, that they fight anti-Semitism, and at the same time support an organization that incites people to kill Jews?

How can they define as “moderate” an organization such as the Palestinian Authority that admits sending terrorists to kill Israelis and that teaches children, on its Facebook page, how to stab Jews to death?

And how can they consider it urgent to give such an organization its own State?

Facts get set aside. Questions do not get asked. Financial rewards continue to be paid by the West.

As Leon Uris states through the protagonist in his novel, Exodus: “To most Gentiles, Jewish meat is cheaper than beef, cheaper than herring.” And that was in 1958. It seems that to most Gentiles, Jewish meat still is cheap.

When the State of Israel was established in 1948, no Western government helped Israeli Jews to resist the five Arab armies that tried to wipe it out at its birth. Today, most Western governments pretend to be friends of Israel. Most are at best fair-weather friends; at worst, not friends in the slightest. Israeli Jews know they can only rely on themselves. They know that others, such as France, are holding knives that are sharpened.

On June 23, Mahmoud Abbas, head of the Palestinian Authority, delivered an anti-Semitic speech from the rostrum of the European Parliament. dishonestly accusing rabbis of urging Israel to poison the water used by Palestinian Arabs. He received an enthusiastic standing ovation from virtually all present. On June 24, he admitted his claim had been false.

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas receives a standing ovation at the European Parliament in Brussels on June 23, after falsely claiming in his speech that Israeli rabbis were calling to poison Palestinian water. Abbas later recanted and admitted that his claim had been false. (Image source: European Parliament)

A few days after that, on July 1, the “Quartet for the Middle East” (EU, USA, Russia, UN) presented a report condemning “Palestinian violence,” and describing the Israeli “colonization” of “Palestinian territories” as a major cause of all problems. The report omits that “Palestinian violence” kills innocents — 13-year-old girls sleeping in bed; families having dinner at a mall in Tel Aviv; fathers driving their families whose only “fault” is that they are Jews — and most of all, that this Palestinian violence is engineered and financed by the West. The report omits is that it is the report’s authors themselves who are instigating this genocide, transforming millions of Arabs into their genocidal hired guns.

Dr. Guy Millière, a professor at the University of Paris, is the author of 27 books on France and Europe.