It really is quite confusing. Last week – following the kidnapping and murder of Italian activist Vittorio Arrigoni – we were told by the usual crowd that Hamas was in the front-line against Al-Qaeda extremism.
For example, Al Jazeera stated that Arrigoni was kidnapped “by a group aligned with al-Qaeda which had demanded that Hamas release Salafist prisoners”. Al Jazeera also remind us that “Hamas forces in August 2009 killed 28 people, mostly Salafis, in the storming of a mosque where a religious leader who supported al-Qaeda surrounded himself with armed men and declared an Islamic emirate.”
Reuters also told us:
A group of strict Islamists aligned with al Qaeda, known as Salafists, had threatened Thursday to execute Arrigoni unless their leader, detained by Hamas last month, was freed… Hamas vehemently opposes the Salafists who espouse a more extreme form of Islam and appear to be attracting recruits — including from among its own ranks.
And yet here we are today, again according to Reuters:
The Palestinian Islamist group Hamas on Monday condemned the killing by U.S. forces of Osama bin Laden and mourned him as an “Arab holy warrior.”
“We regard this as a continuation of the American policy based on oppression and the shedding of Muslim and Arab blood,” Ismail Haniyeh, head of the Hamas administration in the Gaza Strip, told reporters.
Though he noted doctrinal differences between bin Laden’s al Qaeda and Hamas, Haniyeh said: “We condemn the assassination and the killing of an Arab holy warrior. We ask God to offer him mercy with the true believers and the martyrs.”
But wasn’t Hamas supposed to be the West’s first line of defence against Bin Laden, killing and jailing all the Al-Qaeda members it can find in Gaza?
It seems the ‘doctrinal differences’ between the two groups are considered an internal matter “between Muslims”, and Hamas is perfectly willing to close ranks with Al-Qaeda if it comes under threat from non-Muslim parties.
Given this – given Hamas’s clear and unequivocal support for international terrorism – how can anyone in the West continue to support them with a clear conscience? How can Western politicians – chiefly British, it has to be said – agree to be photographed with them, or give them political platforms, or, in The Guardian’s case, provide their shills with newspaper columns?
If Hamas gained any P.R. from the efforts Western far-Leftists made to portray them as a secular democratic force against theocratic terrorists last week during the Arrigoni saga, they’ve just lost it.
For all intents and purposes Hamas is Al-Qaeda. Why else would they eulogise Osama Bin Laden as an “an Arab holy warrior”? Peas. Pods.
habibi adds: here is an example of just how grateful Hamas is for all the support it gets from the UK – a tribute to the murderers of the Mike’s Place attack in Tel Aviv. Click to enlarge.
Next Sunday the Quakers of Friends House London will welcome Hamas supporters Ismail Patel of Friends of Al Aqsa and Zahir Mahmood.
On 23 May Amnesty International will host the Hamasniks of Daud Abdullah’s Middle East Monitor.
While the self-styled Palestine Solidarity Campaign and the stoppers work with “Britain 2 Gaza”, a Hamas front group set up by Hamas operatives Mohammed Sawalha and Zaher Birawi to support the next flotilla to Gaza. Sarah Colborne of the PSC is company secretary of the “Britain 2 Gaza” company alongside directors Sawalha and Birawi.
Mohammed Sawalha (right) with Haniyeh at a ceremony in Gaza honouring Viva Palestina, the Hamas support operation of George Galloway and Kevin Ovenden.
Kevin Ovenden and Zaher Birawi to the right of Haniyeh and Mahmoud Zahar of Hamas at the same ceremony.
