Hamas Must Go
Hamas Is By Far The Greatest Threat Facing The Palestinian Arabs
War is Hell.
William Tecumseh Sherman’s short, brutal, and accurate assessment of armed conflict remains just as true today as it did during the American Civil War a century and a half ago. War is Hell everywhere wars are fought.
War is Hell in Ukraine.
War is Hell in South Sudan.
War is certainly Hell in Gaza, where some 20,000 Palestinian Arabs are reported to have died as a result of the ongoing war between Hamas and Israel.
Any compassionate human being would mourn so much death, and should mourn so much death. However, any just human being must also acknowledge all the parties culpable in so much death. We must acknowledge all the culpable parties, because the essence of accountability lies in each person and each entity answering for their own transgressions, but no one else’s.
With respect to the ongoing war in Gaza between Hamas and Israel, too often we are seeing an imbalance of such accountability. Corporate media and social media alike are more than willing to decry Israel’s attacks upon Gaza, and the attendant loss of life, but there is little or no mention of the role Hamas plays not just in the attacks, but in the attendant loss of life as well.
Thus we have corporate media carrying such admittedly propagandistic pieces as this op-ed column from Yahya R. Sarraj, the Mayor of Gaza City, which appeared in the New York Times on Christmas Eve.
The Israeli invasion has caused the deaths of more than 20,000 people, according to the Gaza Health Ministry, and destroyed or damaged about half the buildings in the territory. The Israelis have also pulverized something else: Gaza City’s cultural riches and municipal institutions.
Accepting for the moment Dr. Sarraj’s assessment of the destruction in Gaza, his op-ed column is silent upon a crucial element of the Israeli invasion of Gaza and thus the destruction: The role of Hamas.
Israel’s actions do not take place in a vacuum. The Israeli Defense Force did not attack Gaza on a whim. The Palestinian Arab casualties are not solely attributable to IDF attacks. At every turn, Hamas plays a central role—and an evil one.
We must never ignore the role of Hamas in events in Gaza. Yet across social media in particular, we see virtue-signalling “protests” that have much to say about the actions of the IDF, but not so much as a syllable about Hamas.
This is an appalling silence, because Hamas is the prime reason the violence is unfolding in Gaza as it is. It is no exaggeration to say that but for Hamas, there would be no Palestinian Arab deaths due to an Israeli invasion of Gaza. That simple truth means Hamas is far and away the greatest threat the Palestinian Arabs face, and must be called out as such.
If there is to be peace between the Palestinian Arabs and Israel, Hamas must go. There is no second option available.
While we should not dismiss Dr. Sarraj’s pain at witnessing the destruction taking place in Gaza, neither should we overlook the disingenuous tenor of his column. There is no mystery behind the questions he asks of Israel.
Why did the Israeli tanks destroy so many trees, electricity poles, cars and water mains? Why would Israel hit a U.N. school? The obliteration of our way of life in Gaza is indescribable. I still feel I am in a nightmare because I can’t imagine how any sane person could engage in such a horrific campaign of destruction and death.
Why would Israel attack with such ferocity? The brutally simple answer is because Hamas attacked Israel with that much ferocity. While we can and should critically examine Israel’s attacks on Gaza, that examination always begins with the clear and explicit recognition that Israel was attacked by Hamas.
The Palestinian militant group Hamas launched unprecedented terror attack on Israel, which has included the firing of thousands of rockets onto the Israel and the infiltration of Israeli territory by land, air, and sea. Responding to the surprise attack Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has declared that the nation is “at war” and the terrorists “will pay a price it has never known before.” Thus far, the attacks in Israel have reportedly left 100 people dead and nearly 1000 wounded. Hamas claims it has captured Israel Defense Force soldiers and civilians during its assault on Israeli border towns outside Gaza. Israel’s military response–“Operation Sword of Iron”– has led to the deaths of 198 Palestinians and 1,610 people injured.
While the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians dates back at least to the founding of Israel in 1948, this latest paroxysm of violence marks the first large scale attack on Israel since the Yom Kippur War of 1973, according to US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken. That alone makes it the major news story of last week, this week, and quite probably this month.
Much like the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941, or the World Trade Center attack on September 11, 2001, or the outset of the Yom Kippur War in 1973, Hamas’ October 7th attack remains the catalyst that sets all the current violence in motion.
Does the October 7th attack inoculate all Israeli actions in Gaza against criticism? Not in the slightest. As I wrote two months ago, in the aftermath of the first strikes on the Jabalya refugee camp, Israel is still obligated to conduct its military operations according to the internationally established “laws of war”, which are codified in the Geneva Conventions, to which Israel has been a signatory since their creation.
Are there instances where Israel has not adhered to the Geneva Conventions? Certainly there are instances where questions should be asked, and arguably instances where the answer to that question is, tragically, “yes”.
What the October 7th attack does is provide Israel with an undeniable and unquestionable casus belli—the “case for war”. What October 7th puts in sharp relief is the reality that Hamas with that attack sowed a wind of war, and is now reaping the whirlwind of perpetual war.
It is true that Israel also has sown that same wind and is reaping that same whirlwind, but there should be no illusion about this war—Hamas without a doubt chose to wage this war, and wage it on the terms by which it is now prosecuted.
We must also acknowledge that Hamas, by the very nature of its strategy, itself commits an appalling and horrific number of war crimes against the Palestinian Arabs.
That Hamas is guilty of war crimes against the Israelis is self-evident: the Geneva Conventions do not permit the taking of hostages or wanton assaults on civilian targets. Everything Hamas did on October 7th was a war crime against Israel, and a crime against humanity—there is no serious debate on that point.
Yet everything Hamas has done since October 7th is a war crime against the Palestinian Arabs.
Hamas has illegally used the Palestinian Arabs has human shields for its bases and supplies.
Hamas has illegally used hospitals, schools, and other civilian structures for combat purposes.
Hamas has stolen humanitarian aid intended for the civilian population in Gaza.
The evidences of these violations of the Geneva Conventions is voluminous and indisputable.
Moreover, fresh evidences continue to emerge, such as this report that the director of the Kamal Adwan Hospital in Jabalya admits the hospital was being used for combat purposes by Hamas—a violation of the Geneva Conventions.
Last week, IDF and Shin Bet forces arrested Ahmed Kahlot, director of Kamal Adwan Hospital in Jabaliya. In his investigation, he told about staff members who belong to the terrorist organization, about the use of the hospital by Hamas to hide forces, and about the transfer of bodies and hostages in ambulances. "They believe that they will not be harmed when they are inside a hospital”
Such admissions mean that Hamas is systematically stripping Gazan hospitals and other structures of their protected status under the Geneva Conventions, rendering them legitimate military targets.
Dr. Sarraj wonders why these infrastructures are being struck by the IDF—this is why. Hamas has orchestrated their vulnerability and ultimately their destruction. Hamas all but demands that Israel attack with force and fury. When senior Hamas leaders promise to repeat the October 7th attacks until Israel is no more, what choice does Israel have but reprisal?
A senior member of Hamas has hailed the systematic slaughter of civilians in Israel on October 7, vowing in an interview that if given the chance, the Palestinian terror group will repeat similar assaults many times in the future until Israel is exterminated.
Note the cruel logic at play here: Hamas’ strategy is to attack Israel, then retreat behind the Palestinian Arab women and children in Gaza, daring Israel to come after them. If Israel does, the world stands appalled at the deaths of the human shields cynically used by Hamas. If Israel does nothing, Hamas is free to attack Israel with impunity.
Is there any nation on earth, any government of any nation on earth, that would plausibly accept the “do nothing” scenario and refuse to protect its own citizens?
Yet all of these acts by Hamas are violations of the Geneva Conventions. All of these acts are war crimes committed by Hamas against the Palestinian Arabs. In terms of sheer number of discrete offenses, Hamas has committed more war crimes against the Palestinian Arabs than any other entity, by several orders of magnitude. Given the murderous illegality of Hamas’ actions vis-a-vis the Geneva Conventions, they are just as culpable if not more culpable than Israel in the deaths of Palestinian Arab civilians, under the same “felony murder” logic that makes any criminal culpable for any deaths arising from his crime.
Yet the horror of Hamas extends beyond its direct violations of the Geneva Conventions. There is also the body of evidence that Hamas has coopted and corrupted the humanitarian relief agencies in Gaza ostensibly directed towards improving the lives of the Palestinian Arabs in Gaza.
As far back as 2008, a school headmaster employed by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees was found to have been a member of Hamas ally Islamic Jihad.
By day, Awad al-Qiq was a respected science teacher and headmaster at a United Nations school in the Gaza Strip. By night, Palestinian militants say, he built rockets for Islamic Jihad.
The Israeli air strike that killed the 33-year-old last week also laid bare his apparent double life and embarrassed a U.N. agency which has long had to rebuff Israeli accusations that it has aided and abetted guerrillas fighting the Jewish state.
Even last year, watchdog groups assessed that educational materials used in UNRWA schools in Gaza and the West Bank were anti-semitic, and promoted terrorism while denying Israel’s right to exist.
New educational materials produced by the United Nations agency responsible for Palestinian refugees include content promoting terrorism, denying Israel’s existence and spreading antisemitism, according to a new watchdog report published on Thursday.
The report by the Institute for Monitoring Peace and Cultural Tolerance in School Education (IMPACT-se), a London- and Ramat Gan, Israel-based group that monitors the content of educational materials distributed by the U.N. Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA), discovered the content after UNRWA had said that all such material had been removed from self-produced materials, according to an IMPACT-se statement.
In the immediate aftermath of the October 7th attacks, a UNRWA school in the West Bank celebrated the Hamas attack.
A school in Nablus run by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) posted a video to its official Facebook page in which a young student called for the victory of Hamas’s “Jihad warriors” in Gaza and evoked Mohammad’s defeat of the Jews at Khaybar, per a new report from the Institute for Monitoring Peace and Cultural Tolerance in School Education (IMPACT-se).
Perhaps the most shocking revelation has been the assertion by released hostages that UNRWA workers participated in the hostages’ captivity.
Bear in mind that taking hostages is categorically a war crime—and it appears that UNRWA workers are facilitating that war crime especially.
The one group who absolutely should not be taking any sides in any conflict is the United Nations, or any of its agencies. Yet the UNRWA time and again is found to be siding with Hamas. Their half-hearted attempts to rebut these claims has only resulted in more reports of even more claims.
In a community note on the agency's post, readers wrote "claims against UNRWA have been documented for a long time," adding a list of links to incidents of its staff being linked to or supporting terrorist organizations.
The list included a case in which a headmaster of an UNRWA school was found to be building rockets for the Palestinian Islamic Jihad terrorist organization, and a recent report by UN Watch showing how agency teachers celebrated the massacre committed by Hamas on October 7.
Hamas has succeeded in corrupting the UNRWA, persuading the organization to support its agenda of genocide against Israel and the Jewish people.
There is no room for prevarication or equivocation where Hamas is concerned—certainly not after October 7th. Regardless of how one views the grievances of the Palestinian Arabs against Israel, Hamas by its conduct not just against Israel but against the Palestinian Arabs has proven itself to be a thoroughly malicious, malevolent, malignant organization. It is an accurate and reasoned assessment to conclude that there will be no peace in Gaza so long as Hamas is a viable presence in that enclave.
With the brutal simplicity that war invariably commands, Hamas must go. Hamas must cease to exist in Gaza, and preferably Hamas must cease to exist, period. If there is to be any peace between the Palestinian Arabs and Israel, Hamas cannot be a part of the picture.
Will eliminating Hamas resolve the conflict between the Palestinian Arabs and Israel? No, it will not. Indeed, Israel’s war on Hamas now is adding to the list of grievances that will eventually have to be addressed if there ever to be peace between the Palestinian Arabs and Israel.
Why is it essential for Hamas to go? Why must the world with one voice condemn Hamas and call for its ending? There are several reasons.
First and foremost is the need for accountability. Hamas flagrantly violates the Geneva Conventions, even though as part of the Palestinian National Authority it acceded to them in 2014. If Hamas is not called out and condemned for their casual disregard of the Geneva Conventions, how can anyone credibly call out Israel when their actions fall outside the boundaries drawn by those Conventions?
If Hamas is given a pass, that is tantamount to eviscerating and ultimately ending the Geneva Conventions themselves. If we no longer have those as an operable standard for the conduct of war, Israel is also excused from adhering to that standard. Do any of us truly wish to go down that road?
Yet beyond that is also the need for mercy and compassion towards the Palestinian Arabs. Hamas was a major reason they continue to live in privation and poverty even before the October 7th attacks, and the war with Israel has only made matters worse for the Palestinian Arabs. No matter how one views the grievances the Palestinian Arabs have with Israel, we should not want for them to live in meaner conditions than necessary. Hamas has inflicted unnecessary suffering on the Palestinian Arabs, and that truth must not be ignored.
Would Gaza be a better place had Hamas not been stealing aid supplies? It is difficult to imagine that answer being anything but “yes”.
Would Gaza not have been the target of Israeli reprisals had Hamas not been launching rockets and raids against Israel? It is difficult to imagine that answer being anything but “yes”.
Would Palestinian Arabs in Gaza be dying now had Hamas not launched their attack of October 7th? It is absolutely certain that answer is “yes”.
Finally, there is the hope all people should have—that there eventually be peace between the Palestinian Arabs and Israel. Hamas is determined that there shall be no peace with Israel but that of the grave, and has managed to drag most of the Palestinian Arab population along with them on that dark ride. So long as Hamas exists, there can be no peace for the Palestinian Arabs.
Let us be clear on the essential ingredient for peace here: the Palestinian Arabs and the Israelis must decide to come together to live side by side harmoniously. Hamas has steadfastly refused to ever coexist with Israel—for them all the land belongs to the Palestinian Arabs and Israel must return all the land of Israel and cease to exist as a nation. That is not a recipe for peace but only for more war.
Hamas has a simple agenda: genocide.
Indeed, the world must for its own sake recognize that Hamas is demonstrably pursuing a double genocide: they are committed to the destruction of the Jewish people, and are just as committed to sacrificing every last Palestinian Arab to achieve that noxious goal. Every action Hamas has taken in Gaza evinces a clear objective of maximizing Palestinian Arab death. The world should not be complicit in Hamas’ dark agenda by remaining silent about it.
If one’s objective is stopping the killing of Palestinian Arabs in Gaza, the surest way to do that is to get rid of Hamas. If one’s objective is to broker a lasting peace between the Palestinian Arabs and Israel, the quickest way to bring that about is to get rid of Hamas. Every pathway to peace between the Palestinian Arabs and Israel has the same first step: get rid of Hamas.
The international community could at any time offer to broker a peace whereby Hamas exited Gaza and stayed out.
There is an historical precedent for this: when Israel invaded Lebanon in 1982 in response to the Palestinian Liberation Organization’s attempted assassination of Israeli ambassador Shlomo Argov and laid seige to Beirut, the United States mediated a resolution where Yasser Arafat and the PLO leadership were evacuated from Beirut. In the current conflict in Gaza, Hamas is not even discussing the possibility of withdrawing from Gaza—it simply demands Israel stop its offensive in Gaza, period. Other nations appear to be quite comfortable with Hamas remaining in control of Gaza, something Israel views as a non-start both politically and diplomatically.
The international community could also at any time demand Hamas cease using Palestinian Arab women and children as human shields; in an ideal world, the United Nations would unanimously pass a resolution condemning Hamas’ use of human shields.
The international community could at any time demand that Hamas not strip Gazan hospitals of vital supplies while turning them into military command centers—and police the flow of humanitarian aid into Gaza to ensure that it is being used for humanitarian purposes rather than being weaponized against Israel..
The international community has not done any of this. If people wish to be appalled by the deaths in Gaza, should they not be appalled by the conduct of both parties to the conflict, Israel and Hamas?
Ending Hamas should not be taken as a whitewash of Israel’s actions in Gaza. To the extent those actions violate the Geneva Conventions—treaties to which Israel has been a signatory from their beginning—they must be held accountable and must answer. To the extent Israel has arguably mistreated the Palestinian Arab populations in the West Bank and Gaza over the years, they must be held accountable and must answer. There can never be peace in either the West Bank or Gaza without at least some accountability.
Yet accountability means holding to account people and nations for what they have done, and not what others have done. Israel needs to answer for its role in all the Palestinian Arab deaths that have occurred, but Israel’s accountability there is tempered by Hamas’ far greater culpability and need for accountability. Hamas must answer as well, or there is no foundation for demanding Israel answer.
For the Palestinian Arabs and for the Israelis, all paths to peace begin with the same first step: getting rid of Hamas. Much work towards peace would still remain, but if Hamas is no more, that work at least has a chance to begin.
Hamas, as bad as they can be, represents the pinnacle of governmental abuse of its citizens, while sustaining 90+% approval, according to Hamas.
The quicker they're gone the better. The body count is the body count, and the cost of such government.
It will require much blood and treasure to destroy the idea of Hamas. Their racist gangster tactics won't just die quietly or without intense resistance. Lord, have mercy......