The Truth About Trump's Abbas Meeting in Bethlehem: It Got Ugly

JERUSALEM, Israel – Early Thursday morning, an Arab woman stabbed an Israeli soldier near the entrance to a Jewish community in Samaria.

The IDF Spokesman's Office posted an initial statement saying "An assailant armed with a knife arrived at the entrance to the Mevo Dotan community, southwest of Jenin, and stabbed an IDF soldier. The soldier has been evacuated to a hospital for further medical treatment." The IDF later told CBN News the attacker was also evacuated to a hospital.

Yet the P.A.'s official Ma'an news agency reported that a Palestinian was injured in an "alleged stabbing." The report referred to Mevo Dotan, founded in 1977, as an "illegal settlement" in the "occupied West Bank."

Distorting the facts or just outright lying is not a new tactic for the Palestinian Authority, a fact that appears to have angered U.S. President Donald Trump.

The president's brief meeting with Abbas 10 days ago in Bethlehem apparently didn't go as well as initially reported.

According to a U.S. official present at the meeting, Trump accused Abbas of lying to him in Washington on May 3, Newsweek reported.

"You tricked me in D.C.," Trump reportedly told him. "You talked there about your commitment to peace, but the Israelis showed me your involvement in incitement," Israel's Channel 2 quoted the U.S. official, who said several minutes of shocked silence followed the president's accusation.

That is not how the P.A. pitched it.

Initially, Abbas insisted the meeting went well. But he changed his tune with PLO officials, saying the meeting with President Trump "was not comfortable," describing him as "angry," the London-based al-Araby al-Jadid newspaper reported.

Abbas blamed the tense meeting on Israel's alleged "incitement" against him.

Two days earlier, the Jerusalem Post quoted a "confidante" of Abbas, Ahmad Majdalani, who called reports of the confrontation at the meeting in Bethlehem "a total fabrication and a lie."

And that, in a nutshell, is often how fake news gets its start. It repeats lies as if it were the truth.

Islam teaches it's acceptable to lie in certain circumstances. Well-known Islam expert Raymond Ibrahim has taught for years on taqiyya.  

The website, What makes Islam so different? explains that lying is permitted when the end justifies the means or to deceive an enemy.

Sahih Bukhari (49:857) - "He who makes peace between the people by inventing good information or saying good things, is not a liar." Lying is permitted when the end justifies the means.

Sahih Bukhari (84:64-65) - Speaking from a position of power at the time, Ali confirms that lying is permitted in order to deceive an "enemy."

Perhaps that factors into the P.A.'s half-truths or all-out fabrications.

There's an old adage that says, "The truth always comes out." That seems to have eluded Palestinian Authority officials. They may need to modify their approach with the current U.S. president.