Final in a three-part series. You can read part one here, and part two here.
Sanitizing the Resistance Axis and its Objectives
Fourth — Reminding the World who Hamas Is
- It is a national liberation movement based on centrist and moderate Islamic thought that rejects extremism and believes in the values of truth, justice, and freedom.
- It prohibits oppression and believes in freedom of religion, civilized human coexistence, and rejects the persecution of any person.
- The war with the Zionist Project is not a war with the Jews because of their religion but with the Zionists because they are occupiers.
- Resisting occupation by any means necessary, including armed resistance, is a lawful right guaranteed by all religious legal systems and confirmed by international laws.
- Our Palestinian people is waging a battle of self-defense, and [defense] of lands and rights, in confrontation against an oppressive occupation which is the longest and most barbaric [of its kind].
- The Occupation has no right to defend its occupation and crimes, instead it is the right of the Palestinian people to engage in resistance.
Analysis
This part of the narrative is meant to sanitize Hamas and its ideology, and make it particularly palatable to Western audiences who abhor systemically discriminatory systems, fear theocracies, and – on some level – find antisemitism distasteful. But such a position is belied by their own words.
Even a cursory reading of Hamas’ Charter demonstrates its staunch anti-Judaism stance. It frames its struggle as being “against the Jews,” and calls “Israel, Jews, and Judaism” a “challenge to Islam and the Moslem people.” The group also says that it “aspires to the realization of Allah’s promise, no matter how long that should take, that ‘The Day of Judgment will not come until Moslems fight the Jews (killing the Jews), when the Jew will hide behind stones and trees. The stones and trees will say O Moslems, O [Servant of God], there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him…” In other words, Hamas views it as part of its current mission to bring into effect one of the more distasteful elements of classical Islamic eschatology.
As for Hezbollah, its leadership routinely disparages Israel in terms reserved in classical Islam for Jews. Nasrallah, for example, routinely refers to Israelis as “killers of the prophets” – an accusation made by classical Islamic sources against the Jews. Hezbollah’s description of Israelis as inherently cowardly also stems from anti-Jewish stereotypes in classical Islamic sources.
Amal Saad-Ghorayeb, in her aforementioned book, devotes an entire chapter to demonstrating that Hezbollah abhors “Judaism as a religion, irrespective of its Zionist offshoot,” and that that “its strong aversion to Judaism is unrelated to its abomination of Zionism, and hence exists irrespective of the existence of Zionism,” but exists because, “according to Hizbu’llah…from time immemorial Jews have continuously demonstrated their quintissentially evil nature…”
In an Oct. 2002 speech, Nasrallah confirmed this understanding, and even expressed (33:53-34:32) what can only be described as Hezbollah’s genocidal aspirations towards Jews – based on the same hadith as the Hamas Charter. “In Islamic prophecies, and not just in Jewish prophecies, [Israel] must arise – and Jews gathered from all corners from the world to Occupied Palestine. Not so their false Messiah can rule the world. Instead, God Almighty wants to spare you pursuing them [lit. going to them] in all corners of the world – so they will congregate in one place…[and] the decisive and final battle will occur. And yes, history is ordered to flow in this direction.”
Fifth — What is Demanded? (Clockwise, then bottom 3 right to left)
- Stopping the Israeli aggression now against the Gaza Strip
- Working to punish the Israeli Occupation legally and seeking to make it pay prices for its crimes.
- Supporting the Resistance against the Israeli Occupation by all means available.
- Taking a serious and active position against double standards exercised by the forces supporting the Israeli occupation.
- Rejecting any international or Israeli plans which seek to decide the future of the Gaza Strip in a manner that will align with the metrics of the Occupation.
- Launching an global international movement to express solidarity with the Palestinian people
- The Great Powers must stop giving cover to the Zionist Entity as if it is above the law.
- Standing against attempts to exile the Palestinians of the Interior [i.e. Arab Israelis], displacing them, and committing a second Nakba.
- Opening the crossings, bringing in aid, and all needs for housing and rebuilding
- Continuing popular pressure — Arabic, Islamic, and international — to end the occupation, and activating anti-normalization campaigns and boycotts of companies supporting the occupation.
Analysis:
The purpose, as noted above, of these end-goals is to bring about a total ceasefire in Gaza to allow the Resistance Axis factions based there to survive, rebuild, and prepare to attack Israel again in the future. The other elements are intended to delegitimize Israeli self-defense now in the court of public opinion and concurrently legitimize violence against it and its citizens, while tying Israel’s hands and hampering its ability to break the ring of fire that the Resistance Axis hopes to continue building around it.
