"An Israeli security source further confirmed to the Maariv newspaper that “the transfer of nine armored vehicles provided by the Americans to the Palestinian Authority is clearly in Israel’s national security interests.”
What can we conclude? The US and Israel do not object to arming the PA if the weapons are directed against resistance cells in the occupied West Bank. The existence of the Palestinian Authority is necessary for Israel as it can reach places that Israeli special units cannot. The PA is a tool that the Israeli National Security Council (the Cabinet) relies on, which explains why on July 9, 2023, the Cabinet held an emergency meeting to approve urgent assistance to save it.
This assistance relies on and mandates the performance of Mahmoud Abbas’ security apparatus to protect settlers when they wander into the occupied West Bank, to thwart resistance cells from carrying out their operations, and to arrest individuals Israel cannot reach.
To carry out this mission, the PA needs weapons, which the US provides and Israel agrees to lend or transfer, under two conditions:
Restricting their distribution to “some Palestinian security agencies,” whose loyalty to Israel is guaranteed. Using them exclusively for “counterterrorism activities.” The Israeli army made a radio broadcast on September 13, 2023, that the occupation government has agreed to transfer weapons and military equipment to the PA on a number of conditions, as part of a series of steps to support the Palestinian Authority and increase security coordination with it.
The broadcast quoted Israeli security officials as saying: “This step is part of a program of assistance to strengthen the Palestinian Authority, and is conditioned upon two things: demonstrating operational achievements by the Palestinian Authority (especially in Jenin), and the official return of security coordination with Israel.”
According to the settler media, the deal includes armored vehicles and at least 1,500 pieces of weaponry, including M-16 rifles enhanced with laser sights and Kalashnikov rifles.
The PA requested these weapons over a year ago, but Israel rejected the request. The approval has now come following the Aqaba and Sharm el-Sheikh summits, held in February and March respectively, at the request of Washington. The goal of these summits was to develop a comprehensive strategy to “pacify” the resistance in the West Bank.
Why do we care about this news? Israeli and US support for the PA comes in the context of arrangements that the US is making in the Arab world that seek to ensure the “integration between Israel and Arab and Muslim-majority states, as exemplified by the Abraham Accords, other normalization agreements, and the Negev Forum.”
Achieving this goal is impossible without achieving “calm” in the Palestinian territories. This “calm” means implementing all US-Israeli projects to deliver a final blow to the Palestinian cause, by turning the occupied West Bank into “Israeli land” and permanently eliminating the Right of Return.
To ensure this “calm,” Israel and the US must rely on the PA’s security agencies and support them financially and militarily."
The notion that if Palestinians fight back it will only worsen their situation is a propaganda narrative spread by the Zionist occupation forces and their allies. This is no different than anti-union propaganda telling workers that it is against their interest to unionize because it would put their jobs at risk. It may carry certain risk for individual people but as a class the only way to win is to fight. The only way for Palestine to resist the genocide that is being perpetrated on them is to fight back with any and all weapons at their disposal and without regard for the moralizing and equivocating of western liberals.
It’s a good point and not the intent of my wording. I will go back and edit it to be clear.
Both things, however, can be true. It can both be true that the Palestinians fighting back is the only way to liberate themselves and also that the USA is creating conditions for the Palestinians to fight back in a way that will advance the goals of the regime in Washington. Obviously if the USA was handing weapons directly to the resistance everyone would need to be suspect of the motives. But the USA doesn’t do that much, instead what they do is they bring weapons under a narrative cover that deflects attention from the fact that they fully expect the weapons to end up with the resistance fighters, and they do it to create conditions that they can more fully control. I will never say that the Palestinians should stop fighting for their own good. I will say that they need to be very wary if this article is pointing to a net new or an intensification of weapons transfers in the region because that might be evidence that the USA is banking on the blowback from their actions (as they have in the past) and are prepared to manage the situation to their benefit.
They are not transferring weapons to the resistance, they are giving them to the Palestinian Authority to suppress the resistance. The PA are a tool of the Zionists designed to control the Palestinians.
I gave up. That person is just loud and ignorant and obviously didn’t even bother clicking the linked article.