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PA Newspaper: Hamas Leaders Should Commit Suicide and Free All Israeli Hostages
People hold Fatah flags during a protest in support of the people of Gaza, as the conflict between Israel and Hamas continued, in Hebron, in the West Bank, Oct. 27, 2023. Photo: REUTERS/Mussa Qawasma
While the Palestinian Authority (PA) has spent months leveraging the civilian suffering in Gaza to criticize its political rival, Hamas, last week the official PA daily took things a step further. The paper called on Hamas leaders to emerge from their tunnels in Gaza armed with two bullets: one to be used on the Hamas political leadership living in luxury in Qatar, and the other on themselves — arguing that suicide would be preferable to the disgrace they should feel for the countless Palestinian deaths they have caused.
Leave [the tunnels] with your handgun, with two bullets in its magazines … and then admit your crime. Then aim it [the gun] at the heads of your admired [Hamas] politicians, in [foreign] capitals … Ask yourselves what benefit this gun has, and the answer will come to you from the last bullet, since your suicide is better than disgrace.
[Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, June 5, 2025]
Hamas should unconditionally release all Israeli hostages, the PA daily continues, because Israel is killing three times the number of hostages every day.
Enough, Hamas leaders. Release them [Israeli hostages] now. Unconditionally remove the handcuffs of death from more than two million [Gazan] hostages who are still alive, and from twenty [Israeli hostages] who you are still haggling over.
[Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, June 5, 2025]
This reflects the ongoing messaging from the Palestinian Authority, which continues to defend the horrific atrocities committed against Jews on October 7 as “legitimate resistance,” while simultaneously criticizing Hamas for enabling Israel’s reentry into Gaza and its subsequent counteroffensive.
In doing so, the PA seeks to bolster its popular support by defending the October 7 massacre — an event widely celebrated among Palestinians — while also shifting responsibility for the claimed 55,000 deaths in Gaza (a number that has never been verified) onto Hamas.
Despite this, recent polls indicate that Hamas remains significantly more popular than Fatah, especially since the October 7 attack elevated Hamas terrorists to the status of Palestinian icons. According to surveys conducted in May 2025, 59% of West Bank Palestinians still believe that the October 7 assault on Israel was the “correct decision” [PSR]. In the hate-saturated Palestinian consciousness, their one day of glory, in which they raped, tortured, burned families alive, and murdered nearly 1200 Jews, was worth the cost all the lives that have been lost in Gaa.
The following is a longer excerpt of a column by Muwaffaq Matar, Fatah Revolutionary Council member and regular columnist for the official PA daily:
Enough, Hamas leaders. Release them [Israeli hostages] now. Unconditionally remove the handcuffs of death from more than two million [Gazan] hostages who are still alive, and from twenty [Israeli hostages] who you are still haggling over to achieve the card of ‘guarantees,’ [that the war will end] which only exists in your imagination…
Release 40 bodies [of hostages]. Their [Israeli] army continues every day to crush the bones of three times that number from among our children, our women, and our elderly. As for your ‘trained’ gun… placed in your hands to create a flood of human blood for [Iran’s] regional political and military objectives, …do not hand over this handgun, but rather keep it to execute upon yourselves the punishment mentioned in the Quran…
Leave [the tunnels] with your handgun, with two bullets in its magazine. Then look at the innocent living people – the uprooted, the wounded, the amputees… and then admit your crime. Then aim it [the gun] at the heads of your admired [Hamas] politicians, in [foreign] capitals, who have filled bottles with the blood of our people – which is priceless – like a fine wine, and presented them as a gift to their lords [Iran] in the land of Persia and other Arabic speakers. Then ask yourselves what benefit this gun has, and the answer will come to you from the last bullet, since your suicide is better than disgrace.
[Official PA daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, June 5, 2025]
The author is the Founder and Director of Palestinian Media Watch, where a version of this article first appeared.
The post PA Newspaper: Hamas Leaders Should Commit Suicide and Free All Israeli Hostages first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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After False Dawns, Gazans Hope Trump Will Force End to Two-Year-Old War
Palestinians walk past a residential building destroyed in previous Israeli strikes, after Hamas agreed to release hostages and accept some other terms in a US plan to end the war, in Nuseirat, central Gaza Strip October 4, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Mahmoud Issa
Exhausted Palestinians in Gaza clung to hopes on Saturday that US President Donald Trump would keep up pressure on Israel to end a two-year-old war that has killed tens of thousands and displaced the entire population of more than two million.
Hamas’ declaration that it was ready to hand over hostages and accept some terms of Trump’s plan to end the conflict while calling for more talks on several key issues was greeted with relief in the enclave, where most homes are now in ruins.
“It’s happy news, it saves those who are still alive,” said 32-year-old Saoud Qarneyta, reacting to Hamas’ response and Trump’s intervention. “This is enough. Houses have been damaged, everything has been damaged, what is left? Nothing.”
GAZAN RESIDENT HOPES ‘WE WILL BE DONE WITH WARS’
Ismail Zayda, 40, a father of three, displaced from a suburb in northern Gaza City where Israel launched a full-scale ground operation last month, said: “We want President Trump to keep pushing for an end to the war, if this chance is lost, it means that Gaza City will be destroyed by Israel and we might not survive.
“Enough, two years of bombardment, death and starvation. Enough,” he told Reuters on a social media chat.
“God willing this will be the last war. We will hopefully be done with the wars,” said 59-year-old Ali Ahmad, speaking in one of the tented camps where most Palestinians now live.
“We urge all sides not to backtrack. Every day of delay costs lives in Gaza, it is not just time wasted, lives get wasted too,” said Tamer Al-Burai, a Gaza City businessman displaced with members of his family in central Gaza Strip.
After two previous ceasefires — one near the start of the war and another earlier this year — lasted only a few weeks, he said; “I am very optimistic this time, maybe Trump’s seeking to be remembered as a man of peace, will bring us real peace this time.”
RESIDENT WORRIES THAT NETANYAHU WILL ‘SABOTAGE’ DEAL
Some voiced hopes of returning to their homes, but the Israeli military issued a fresh warning to Gazans on Saturday to stay out of Gaza City, describing it as a “dangerous combat zone.”
Gazans have faced previous false dawns during the past two years, when Trump and others declared at several points during on-off negotiations between Hamas, Israel and Arab and US mediators that a deal was close, only for war to rage on.
“Will it happen? Can we trust Trump? Maybe we trust Trump, but will Netanyahu abide this time? He has always sabotaged everything and continued the war. I hope he ends it now,” said Aya, 31, who was displaced with her family to Deir Al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip.
She added: “Maybe there is a chance the war ends at October 7, two years after it began.”
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Mass Rally in Rome on Fourth Day of Italy’s Pro-Palestinian Protests
A Pro-Palestinian demonstrator waves a Palestinian flag during a national protest for Gaza in Rome, Italy, October 4, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Claudia Greco
Large crowds assembled in central Rome on Saturday for the fourth straight day of protests in Italy since Israel intercepted an international flotilla trying to deliver aid to Gaza, and detained its activists.
People holding banners and Palestinian flags, chanting “Free Palestine” and other slogans, filed past the Colosseum, taking part in a march that organizers hoped would attract at least 1 million people.
“I’m here with a lot of other friends because I think it is important for us all to mobilize individually,” Francesco Galtieri, a 65-year-old musician from Rome, said. “If we don’t all mobilize, then nothing will change.”
Since Israel started blocking the flotilla late on Wednesday, protests have sprung up across Europe and in other parts of the world, but in Italy they have been a daily occurrence, in multiple cities.
On Friday, unions called a general strike in support of the flotilla, with demonstrations across the country that attracted more than 2 million, according to organizers. The interior ministry estimated attendance at around 400,000.
Italy’s right-wing government has been critical of the protests, with Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni suggesting that people would skip work for Gaza just as an excuse for a longer weekend break.
On Saturday, Meloni blamed protesters for insulting graffiti that appeared on a statue of the late Pope John Paul II outside Rome’s main train station, where Pro-Palestinian groups have been holding a protest picket.
“They say they are taking to the streets for peace, but then they insult the memory of a man who was a true defender and builder of peace. A shameful act committed by people blinded by ideology,” she said in a statement.
Israel launched its Gaza offensive after Hamas terrorists staged a cross border attack on October 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people and taking 251 people hostage.
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Hamas Says It Agrees to Release All Israeli Hostages Under Trump Gaza Plan
Smoke rises during an Israeli military operation in Gaza City, as seen from the central Gaza Strip, October 2, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Dawoud Abu Alkas
Hamas said on Friday it had agreed to release all Israeli hostages, alive or dead, under the terms of US President Donald Trump’s Gaza proposal, and signaled readiness to immediately enter mediated negotiations to discuss the details.