Hamas

I’ve run across people who make odd statements regarding the current war Israel is waging against the terrorist organization Hamas in Gaza. I’ve read phrases such as “war accomplishes nothing. Killing doesn’t change anything except perhaps to engender more anger and hatred on both sides.”

I suppose those who write or say that such things imagine they are being profound or sensitive, but I simply find myself puzzled and pissed off. Do they mean to tell me that the Allies who attacked and defeated Germany in World War II accomplished nothing—and that World War II accomplished nothing? Killing Nazis only “engendered more anger and hatred on both sides?”

How exactly was the world supposed to respond to the Nazis? Would the critics of Israel make similar comments about the American Revolution or the Civil War?

I’m sorry, but such words from those who criticize Israel, who try to make Israel and Hamas somehow morally equivalent, strike me as nonsense or worse.

Likewise those who say, “look how the Israelis have killed hundreds of Palestinians but only thirteen Israelis died from the rockets that Hamas shot at them.” As if the numbers of bodies one can stack up means something in the context of this recent conflict. Imperial Japan only killed 2402 Americans and wounded 1282 at Pearl Harbor in 1941. So after the United States had killed and wounded that many Japanese the war should have ended? The fact that the United States went on pounding on the Empire of Japan until it was totally defeated was a “disproportionate” response and a crime against humanity? I don’t think so.

I just don’t understand what is going on in the minds of a lot of people. But I think they make such foolish statements simply because they are unwilling to believe just how bad the enemies of Israel are.

There is no moral equivalency between Israel and Hamas. That would be like trying to equate England and Germany in World War II. And yes, I do mean that Hamas is Nazi-like. Hamas (an Arabic acronym standing for “Islamic Resistance Movement”) was created in 1987 by Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, Abdel Aziz al-Rantissi and Mohammad Taha of the Palestinian wing of the Muslim Brotherhood. The Muslim Brotherhood was founded in 1928 by the Egyptian schoolteacher Hassan al-Banna. Their credo is “Allah is our objective. The Prophet is our leader. Qur’an is our law. Jihad is our way. Dying in the way of Allah is our highest hope.” It is a violent, anti-Semitic organization. Likewise, Hamas is a consistently violent, anti-peace organization which believes in strange anti-Semitic conspiracy theories.

The Hamas charter (adopted in 1988), states in article 13 that “Initiatives, and so-called peaceful solutions and international conferences, are in contradiction to the principles of the Islamic Resistance Movement. Abusing any part of Palestine is abuse directed against part of religion. Nationalism of the Islamic Resistance Movement is part of its religion. Its members have been fed on that. For the sake of hoisting the banner of Allah over their homeland they fight.” Article 13 goes on to state, “Now and then the call goes out for the convening of an international conference to look for ways of solving the (Palestinian) question. Some accept, others reject the idea, for this or other reason, with one stipulation or more for consent to convening the conference and participating in it. Knowing the parties constituting the conference, their past and present attitudes towards Moslem problems, the Islamic Resistance Movement does not consider these conferences capable of realizing the demands, restoring the rights or doing justice to the oppressed.” And “There is no solution for the Palestinian question except through Jihad. Initiatives, proposals and international conferences are all a waste of time and vain endeavors.” Article 22 sees the Masons, the Lions Club and the Rotary Club as part of a conspiracy with “the purpose of sabotaging societies and achieving Zionist interests.”

Egypt is now ruled by a thug who is part of the Moslem Brotherhood. Are we to be surprised that he supports the actions of Hamas, given that he is part of the same movement?
The reality is this: if the terrorists of Hamas laid down their weapons tomorrow, there would be peace. If Israel laid down their weapons, they would be killed.
It takes two to make peace. Hamas does not want peace. They explicitly state their opposition to peace in their founding charter and repeat their opposition in their current pronouncements. Hamas just wants the Jews to die. That is a very ugly truth that a lot of people simply are unwilling to face. It’s not the first time people have been unwilling to face such ugly truths, of course. We’d prefer to imagine that Hamas (and many of their fellow travelers) don’t really mean what they say. We would prefer to believe that there’s some other thing that is really behind all the bloodshed: maybe Western imperialism, or economic deprivation, Israeli intransigence, or something else that is more appealing to our sensibilities.
Unfortunately, sometimes the bad guys really are just bad. Sometimes they really are just Nazis who hate the Jews because they are Jews. Sometimes peace really isn’t possible.
Remember some relatively recent history when you think about comparing Israel and Hamas. Hamas is responsible for suicide bombers and calls for the death of Jews on a regular basis. In contrast, Israel withdrew from Gaza and was rewarded by rocket and mortar barrages. Israel gave back the Sinai to Egypt in exchange for peace with Egypt in 1979. In 1948 the United Nations voted to partition Palestine into a Jewish and a Palestinian Arab state. The Jews accepted that UN resolution. The Arabs rejected it and went to war. Between 1948 and 1967 Egypt held the Gaza, while Jordan controlled the West Bank. Why was there no call for a Palestinian state for the Palestinian Arabs then, when their Arab neighbors controlled that territory? Why was the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) formed in 1964, three years before Israel captured the West Bank and Gaza in the 6 Day War? And why did the PLO attack Israel rather than Egypt or Jordan before 1967? For that matter, what was the excuse for Egypt, Jordan, Syria and other Moslem governments for attacking Israel repeatedly before 1967?

It makes me wonder if maybe the radical and tyrannical Moslem governments of the Middle East, and their proxies in Hamas and the other terrorist organizations, don’t really care about the Palestinians at all. Instead, it makes me think that maybe it is simply that the tyrants find it useful to blame the Jews as a way of distracting their oppressed people from who their real enemies are.