Deputy Foreign Minister Zev Elkin returned Sunday from a weekend in the Galilee, during which he visited the village of Pekiin, including the town’s ancient synagogue.

PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas – Photo Mark Israel Sellem

Elkin followed his visit with a post to Facebook suggesting that Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas might benefit from a similar trip.

“Next time that Abu Mazen [Abbas – ed.] argues that the Palestinians are the original inhabitants of the land, going back thousands of years, it should be recommended that he visit Pekiin,” Elkin wrote.

“Which, by the way, is not far from Tzfat, where the ‘new historian’ Abbas was born,” he noted.

Abbas should speak to Margalit Zinati, the final remaining Jewish resident of Pekiin, Elkin suggested. “He should hear from the famous Margalit, and from the Druze who live there, about how Jews lived there continuously for thousands of years,” he said.

Elkin then switched to open criticism of Abbas. “Really, what can we expect from a historian who got his academic degree for his work trying to deny the Holocaust?” he asked.

The PA Chairman’s infamous PhD thesis entitled “The Other Side: the Secret Relationship Between Nazism and Zionism” questions the extent of the Holocaust and suggests it was in fact engineered by Jewish leaders to “justify” the establishment of the State of Israel.

“This is the ‘partner’ that the international community is pushing us to give free gifts to at the expense of the security of Israeli citizens! We won’t agree,” Elkin continued.

“The time has come to learn from all the mistakes we made over the past 20 years,” he concluded.

Elkin has repeatedly turned the spotlight on the PA leadership during ongoing Israel-PA talks. He has previously warned against trusting the PA security forces, has publicly termed the PA “stubborn,” and has suggested that Israel should respond to international boycotts by building in Judea and Samaria (West Bank).

Abbas has been criticized for other Israeli leaders as well, primarily due to the ongoing anti-Semitic and anti-Israel incitement under the PA, and due to the fact that his term in office expired several years ago.

View original Arutz Sheva publication at: http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/177753#.Uwn3hoVIVgg