JERUSALEM – Following the recent Temple Mount crisis that Palestinian leaders have warned is the first of many “rounds of battle,” the Palestinian Authority’s Presidential Guard posted a message urging people to “water freedom with the blood of Palestine’s sons,” Israeli monitoring group Palestinian Media Watch reported. 

“A people like the people of Palestine that has watered the freedom with the blood of its sons can only win,” read a post on the Facebook page of the PA Presidential Guard, accompanied by an image of former PLO leader Yasser Arafat and a map of the whole of Israel in the colors of the Palestinian flag. Such a map of Israel is a common theme in PA propaganda and reinforces the message that the Palestinians have no intention of allowing a Jewish state to continue to exist.

The slogan is reminiscent of a similar statement made by Thomas Jefferson, who said, “The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.”

Following a July 14 terror attack on the Temple Mount in which Arab gunmen smuggled weapons onto the holy site and shot and killed two Israeli police officers, Israel installed new security measures, including metal detectors, at the entrances. The measures sparked outrage throughout the Arab and Muslim world, which accused Israel of trying to control the site. The Palestinian leadership urged Muslims to take part in several “Days of Rage” and riot in the streets of Jerusalem and the West Bank.

Netanyahu eventually gave the order to remove the new security measures, which Palestinians hailed as a huge victory. However, even though the crisis was resolved, the Palestinian leadership warned that it was only the beginning.

As Breitbart Jerusalem reported, PA Foreign Minister Riyad al-Maliki on Tuesday told a gathering of 57 of his counterparts that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will not give up on his quest to regain control of the Temple Mount and the Muslim world should prepare itself for the next “very nasty” round of conflict over the holy site in Jerusalem.

Palestinian leaders often repeat the message that saving “Palestine” means sacrificing the “blood of Martyrs.”