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‘Hamas Offered Hope’: Sky News’s Absurd Analysis of the October 7 Attacks
The body of a motorist lies on a road following a mass-infiltration by Hamas gunmen from the Gaza Strip, in Sderot, southern Israel October 7, 2023. REUTERS/Ammar Awad
In a mind-boggling blend of speculation and misconceptions, Sky News military analyst Sean Bell’s latest “analysis,” says that Hamas’ surprise attack on Israel was a calculated move meant to provide a catalyst for international intervention in the intractable Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and to “perhaps kick-start progress towards an enduring two-state solution.”
In order to reach his conclusions, Bell would have to disregard Hamas’ ideology and modus operandi, the history of the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, and the intense anti-Israel hostility that permeates Palestinian society.
Speculating that Hamas launched a war to focus attention on achieving a two-state solution is what passes as “analysis” from @SkyNews.
Hamas is open about its aims – the destruction of Israel. A two-state solution isn’t compatible with that.
Reminder to military analyst Sean… pic.twitter.com/5DfXc7Rs2c
— HonestReporting (@HonestReporting) December 23, 2023
For Sean Bell, the failure of Israel and the Palestinians to reach a peaceful solution via diplomatic and political channels, coupled with a spiraling decline in the quality of life for Palestinians in Gaza, presented Hamas with an opportunity to provide an alternative way of moving toward an “enduring peace.”
In Bell’s words, “Hamas offered hope.”
This “hope” took the form of the October 7 attacks, which Hamas calculated would unleash an unprecedented Israeli response but would also provoke international (particularly US) intervention in the region, laying the groundwork for a “more sustainable long-term solution.”
Thus, according to Bell, the vast tunnel network created by Hamas with millions of dollars of aid money was built so that the Palestinian terror organization could weather out Israel’s response while awaiting the international intervention that was destined to follow.
In Bell’s eyes, Hamas is a rational actor, providing an alternative to the fruitless path of political negotiations by engaging in barbarism and cruelty.
To make this case, Bell must ignore the fact that in the years following the signing of the Oslo Accords, Hamas engaged in a campaign of terrorism directed at Israeli civilians, the goal being to derail the ongoing peace process.
In addition, for Bell to make Hamas into some sort of advocate for a two-state solution, he also has to disregard statements made by Hamas leaders in the wake of October 7.
These statements include the remarks by Ghazi Hamad, who called for repeated October 7-like attacks until Israel is destroyed, and Osama Hamdan’s recent assertion that Hamas’ stance remains the refusal to recognize Israel’s legitimacy in any part of the land.
Hamas Official Ghazi Hamad: We Will Repeat the October 7 Attack Time and Again Until Israel Is Annihilated; We Are Victims – Everything We Do Is Justified #Hamas #Gaza #Palestinians pic.twitter.com/kXu3U0BtAP
— MEMRI (@MEMRIReports) November 1, 2023
Following the presentation of his faulty analysis, Bell then seeks to corroborate his claims by noting that, despite the destruction wrought by Israel’s response to Hamas’ atrocities, the terror organization’s popularity has risen in both Gaza and the West Bank.
For Bell, the reason for this hike in support is that the attacks have shone a light on the fact that Israel “has no intention of pursuing a two-state solution.”
Aside from the fact that Bell bases this assertion on the remarks of one Israeli official (hardly evidence for what Bell deems to be “Israel’s pursuit of a one-state solution”), his explanation for this burgeoning support is not borne out by the facts.
In the same poll that documented the rise in Palestinian approval for Hamas, it was noted that only 34% of Palestinians support a two-state solution, and that almost 70% of Palestinians support the use of armed resistance to achieve Palestinian goals.
Therefore, is rising Palestinian support for Hamas post-October 7 due to its causing the world to pay attention to the region — or is Palestinians’ support of Hamas an affirmation of the terrorist organization’s audacious invasion of Israel and the blow that it dealt to the Jewish state’s security?
With his rationalization of Hamas’ invasion, it would appear that Bell is almost legitimizing the terror group’s activities on October 7.
Perhaps that is why he felt it necessary to punctuate his piece with statements like “this in no way justifies Hamas’s brutal atrocities on October 7.”
However, despite his protestations, it is clear that Bell believes there was a calculated logic behind Hamas’ October 7 attack, with a long-term solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as its ultimate goal.
Along with his characterization of the attack as possibly a “prudent strategy” and his questioning of whether the tunnels are “a very astute investment by Hamas on behalf of the Palestinian people,” it is clear that Sean Bell’s analysis is steeped in a simplistic and naïve understanding of Israel, Hamas, and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Is this the type of analysis that Sky News finds worthy of publication?
The post ‘Hamas Offered Hope’: Sky News’s Absurd Analysis of the October 7 Attacks first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Smotrich Says Defense Ministry to Spur Voluntary Emigration from Gaza
Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich attends an inauguration event for Israel’s new light rail line for the Tel Aviv metropolitan area, in Petah Tikva, Israel, Aug. 17, 2023. Photo: REUTERS/Amir Cohen
i24 News – Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said on Sunday that the government would establish an administration to encourage the voluntary migration of Palestinians from the Gaza Strip.
“We are establishing a migration administration, we are preparing for this under the leadership of the Prime Minister [Benjamin Netanyahu] and Defense Minister [Israel Katz],” he said at a Land of Israel Caucus at the Knesset, Israel’s parliament. “The budget will not be an obstacle.”
Referring to the plan championed by US President Donald Trump, Smotrich noted the “profound and deep hatred towards Israel” in Gaza, adding that “sources in the American government” agreed “that it’s impossible for two million people with hatred towards Israel to remain at a stone’s throw from the border.”
The administration would be under the Defense Ministry, with the goal of facilitating Trump’s plan to build a “Riviera of the Middle East” and the relocation of hundreds of thousands of Gazans for rebuilding efforts.
“If we remove 5,000 a day, it will take a year,” Smotrich said. “The logistics are complex because you need to know who is going to which country. It’s a potential for historical change.”
The post Smotrich Says Defense Ministry to Spur Voluntary Emigration from Gaza first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Defense Ministry: 16,000 Wounded in War, About Half Under 30
A general view shows the plenum at the Knesset, Israel’s parliament, in Jerusalem. Photo: REUTERS/Ronen Zvulun
i24 News – The Knesset’s (Israeli parliament’s) Special Committee for Foreign Workers held a discussion on Sunday to examine the needs of wounded and disabled IDF soldiers and the response foreign caregivers could provide.
During the discussion, data from the Defense Minister revealed that the number of registered IDF wounded and disabled veterans rose from 62,000 to 78,000 since the war began on October 7, 2023. “Most of them are reservists and 51 percent of the wounded are up to 30 years old,” the ministry’s report said. The number will increase, the ministry assesses, as post-trauma cases emerge.
The committee chairwoman, Knesset member Etty Atiya (Likud), emphasized the need to reduce unnecessary bureaucracy for the wounded and to remove obstacles. “There is no dispute that the IDF disabled have sacrificed their bodies and souls for the people of Israel, for the state of Israel,” she said. Addressing the veterans, she continued: “And we, as public representatives and public servants alike, must do everything, but everything, to improve your lives in any way possible, to alleviate your pain and the distress of your family members who are no less affected than you.”
Currently, extensions are being given to the IDF veterans on a three-month basis, which Atiya said creates uncertainty and fear among the patients.
“The committee calls on the Interior Minister [Moshe Arbel] to approve as soon as possible the temporary order on our table, so that it will reach the approval of the Knesset,” she said, adding that she “intends to personally approach the Director General of the Population Authority [Shlomo Mor-Yosef] on the matter in order to promote a quick and stable solution.”
The post Defense Ministry: 16,000 Wounded in War, About Half Under 30 first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Over 1,300 Killed in Syria as New Regime Accused of Massacring Civilians
Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad speaks during an interview with Sky News Arabia in Damascus, Syria in this handout picture released by the Syrian Presidency on August 8, 2023. Syrian Presidency/Handout via REUTERS
i24 News – Over 1,300 people were killed in two days of fighting in Syria between security forces under the new Syrian Islamist leaders and fighters from ousted president Bashar al-Assad’s Alawite sect on the other hand, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights on Sunday.
Since Thursday, 1,311 people had been killed, according to the Observatory, including 830 civilians, mainly Alawites, 231 Syrian government security personnel, and 250 Assad loyalists.
The intense fighting broke out late last week as the Alawite militias launched an offensive against the new government’s fighters in the coastal region of the country, prompting a massive deployment ordered by new leader Ahmed al-Sharaa.
“We must preserve national unity and civil peace as much as possible and… we will be able to live together in this country,” al-Sharaa said, as quoted in the BBC.
The death toll represents the most severe escalations since Assad was ousted late last year, and is one of the most costly in terms of human lives since the civil war began in 2011.
The counter-offensive launched by al-Sharaa’s forces was marked by reported revenge killings and atrocities in the Latakia region, a stronghold of the Alawite minority in the country.
The post Over 1,300 Killed in Syria as New Regime Accused of Massacring Civilians first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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