Palestinian Islamic Jihad terrorists gather at a mourning house for Palestinians who were killed during Israel-Gaza fighting, as a ceasefire holds, in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip, Aug. 8, 2022. Photo: REUTERS/Ibraheem Abu Mustafa

While the future of the Gaza Strip is yet unknown, the Palestinian Authority (PA) is busy suggesting a solution that will destroy Israel as a Jewish state.

Reacting to US President Donald Trump’s plan to relocate the Gazan Arabs from the Gaza Strip, PA chief Mahmoud Abbas and other top PA leaders are calling for a “return” of Gazan “refugees” to places in Israel that they claim are “their homes and villages” in “Palestine”:

Mahmoud Abbas: All Palestinian “refugees” in Gaza should “return to their cities” in Israel

PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas: “Today, 2.3 million Palestinians live in the Gaza Strip, of whom 1.5 million are refugees who sought refuge after they were expelled from their lands in 1948, during which they were subjected to more than 50 massacres by the Zionist terrorist gangs.

If the Americans want a solution – the only place they [the refugees] need to return to is their cities and villages from which they were expelled during the Nakba ([i.e., “the catastrophe,” the establishment of Israel], to implement UN Resolution 194. … [emphasis added]

[Official PA TV News, Feb. 15, 2025]

Abbas’ advisor: Abbas said Gazans should return to “their homes and villages” in Israel

PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas’ Advisor on Religious Affairs and Islamic Relations Mahmoud Al-Habbash: “[PA] President Mahmoud Abbas clearly said: If there is a possibility of the Palestinians leaving the Gaza Strip, let it be to their cities and villages from which their [Palestinian] families were expelled in 1948

… Because 75% of the residents of the Gaza Strip are originally refugees from historical Palestine. If they [Israelis] want them to leave, let them return to their homes, their cities, and their villages.” [emphasis added]

[PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas’ Advisor on Religious Affairs and Islamic Relations Mahmoud Al-Habbash, YouTube channel, March 22, 2025]

Abbas’ advisor: “Refugees” from Gaza “should return” to Israel, all else is “unrealistic, immoral, illegal”

Al-Habbash: “More than 70% of the civilians living in the Gaza Strip are refugees whose families were expelled in 1948 during the Nakba. They were expelled from Palestine. Any uprooting of them, any leaving by them from the Gaza Strip should be a return to their cities and villages from which their families were expelled in 1948.

Anything other than this is unrealistic, immoral, illegal, inhumane, unimplementable, and the Palestinians cannot agree to it.” [emphasis added]

[Mahmoud Al-Habbash, YouTube channel, Feb. 16, 2025]

Fatah Spokesman calls for “right of return”: Gazans should “return to land and homes” in Israel

Fatah Spokesman Abd Al-Fattah Doleh: “If they [the US and Israel] want to talk about something related to [Palestinian] migration, they should talk about the Palestinian people’s right to return to its land and homes from which it was expelled.

A large number of Gaza residents are refugees and uprooted people who need to return to their land that was occupied in 1948 and 1967. This is the only solution related to the Palestinian people’s rights, only return.” [emphasis added]

[Al-Bawaba (Egyptian news website), YouTube channel, March 11, 2025]

The Fatah Revolutionary Council issued a summary statement from a convention in February 2025, in which they also stressed that:

“Given the uprooting plans, it is necessary to implement the right of return, as explicitly stated in the UN General Assembly resolution 194 in 1949. Any return or population movement must be to the cities and villages from which our fathers and grandfathers were uprooted in 1948…” [emphasis added]

[Official PA daily, Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, Feb. 23, 2025]

Human rights activist: Palestinians have “a right” to flood Israel, “to return to their homes in the 1948” territories

Director of the Al-Haq Institute for Human Rights Sha’awan Jabarin: “We believe that it is our people’s right to enjoy freedom and independence, and it is the right of our refugees to return to their land and their homes, and I don’t mean to return only to the 1967 [territories], but rather to their homes in the 1948 [territories] [i.e., all of sovereign Israel].

I say here that this is a legal, legitimate, and fundamental right.” [emphasis added]

[Official PA TV News, March 31, 2025]

For many Arabs and Palestinians, the thought of Palestinian “refugees returning” heralds the end of Israel, something they consider a “historic right” and a “promise” that Allah will surely fulfill.

PA TV serves as platform for call for the “end of Israel”

Egyptian Al-Azhar Cleric Sheikh Yasser Mustafa Younes: “Allah willing, we will all merit to reclaim Jerusalem and all of Palestine from the occupation [Israel] and the Zionist entity, Allah willing, and they will disappear.” [emphasis added]

[Official PA TV, Palestine is Not for Sale, March 8, 2025]

The author is a senior analyst at Palestinian Media Watch, where a version of this article was originally published.