Gaza Between Hamas and the Israeli Monster

Accusing Hamas of igniting a futile war, as an implementation of an Iranian agenda, is equivalent to denying the historical and human rights of the Palestinian people. This is an equation established by the Israeli propaganda machine, and it is completely contrary to the truth. The tragic reality that the people of Gaza have come to live in, with all of its inhumane and immoral aspects, requires us to stand with the Palestinian people – innocent victims whose only sin is the fact that they happen to live in the Gaza Strip, which has been taken over by a violent terror organization. Hamas’ leaders fled Palestine in order to fight from a distance, leaving behind men, women, and children to suffer. The outcome of the current Gaza war already is and will continue to be disastrous. Not only because it is an asymmetrical war but also because it managed to portray the Palestinian side as the aggressor with respect to the international community. Unlike the popular protests we’re witnessing in different capitals around the world, held by Palestinians and their allies, the halls of the world’s most influential international institutions are filled with individuals who stand by Israel’s side. How absurd it is for the Western world to convict the victim of initiating the aggression. How ridiculous it is to blame the victim for encouraging his own death. All political talk now revolves around Hamas rockets. And if the international community itself has shown a kind of leniency with the Houthis in Yemen as they direct their missiles and drones at Saudi civilian targets, then its position will not be the same with regard to rockets fired by Hamas toward Israel, even though the source is the same – namely, Iran. That is what we know and what one must keep in mind, regardless of acceptance or rejection. It has become evident that the world has double standards. All we have to do in this regard is to remember what happened to Iraq based on suspicions of weapons of mass destruction compared to what is happening with Iran, whose nuclear program is known to all. This is a crime, but the greatest crime is committed by most of the Arab media, which mislead the Arab public and delude it of the crimes committed by the Israeli monster. Israel does not differentiate between the people of Gaza and the armed organizations that rule it; both are one and the same. If we assume goodwill on the part of Hamas – that is, that it launched Iranian missiles at Israel in solidarity with the residents of the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood – then this act is nothing more than political stupidity. What is far more likely is that Gaza is being used by Iran to flex its muscles at a time that coincides with the nuclear negotiations in Vienna. Make no mistake, this is a double crime: first, because it diverted attention away from the Israeli crimes in Jerusalem; and second, because it resulted in the death of innocent Palestinians. Gaza has gone up in flames while Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh sits at his comfortable Qatari mansion and follows the events as if they were a reality television show. He talks about a victory that he knows no one believes. He will return to Gaza not to see its devastation, reassure the comfort of its dead, and count the number of its orphans, but to reproduce the deceptive popular discourse teeming with religious metaphors that mislead the people. Hamas is fighting on behalf of Iran. Whether we like it or not, the tragic reality of the Palestinians in Gaza will not erase that. –Farouk Youssef (translated by Asaf Zilberfarb)