PALESTINIAN AMBASSADOR GIVES EYEWITNESS ACCOUNT OF

C O N F I D E N T I A L DOHA 000025 SIPDIS E.O. 12958: DECL: 01/18/2020 TAGS: PREL KPAL WBG QA SUBJECT: PALESTINIAN AMBASSADOR GIVES EYEWITNESS ACCOUNT OF QARADAWI REMARKS ON ABBAS Classified By: Ambassador Joseph E. LeBaron for reasons 1.4 (b and d). -------------- (C) KEY POINTS -------------- -- At a January 14 meeting with Ambassador, Palestinian Ambassador Mounir Abdullah Ghanim gave an eyewitness account of Imam Youssef Al-Qaradawi's January 8 sermon condemning Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. -- Ghanim said that Qaradawi called for Abbas to be stoned in Mecca only if/if an investigation and trial found him guilty of collaborating with Israel. -- Ambassador Ghanim criticized the news media for choosing to focus on the nature of the allegations and not the fact that Qaradawi had first called for an investigation into Abbas's action. The result was that Islamists now hate Abbas for collaborating with Israel. -------------- (C) COMMENTS -------------- -- Given the opportunity to lay all the blame on Qaradawi, the Palestinian Ambassador did not, choosing instead to fault the media for not reporting the full extent of Qaradawi's remarks. -- Since Ambassador Ghanim has criticized Qaradawi to us in the past, his account of the sermon strikes us as at least credible. End Key Points and Comments. ¶1. (C) At a January 14 meeting with Ambassador, Palestinian Ambassador Mounir Abdullah Ghanim offered a firsthand account of Imam Yousef Al-Qaradawi's January 8 sermon in which he called for the death of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. The remarks were delivered during Friday prayers at Doha's Omar bin Al-Khattab mosque. ¶2. (C) According to Ghanim, Qaradawi railed against Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in his sermon, accusing him of opposing the Goldstone Report because of an Israeli threaten to withhold contracts from a mobile communications company co-owned by one of Abbas's sons. He further alleged that Al Jazeera had aired proof that Abbas had acted under Israeli pressure in responding to the Goldstone report. Ghanim reported that these accusations made the worshippers in the mosque furious with Abbas. ¶3. (C) Qaradawi went on to call for an investigation and a trial into the Palestinian President's actions. "If found guilty", he said, not only should Abbas be executed, but he should be stoned in Mecca. Ghanim condemned media reports of this sermon for, he alleged, not including the words "if found guilty". ¶4. (C) The Palestinian Ambassador said that the media, by downplaying the fact that Qaradawi's call for Abbas's death had been conditioned on a finding of guilt, had inflamed Islamic extremists. "Islamists now hate Abu Maazen and the Palestinian Authority for collaborating with crusaders and Jews," he said. LeBaron