RUTHFULLY YOURS

After bringing death and destruction on the residents of the Gaza Strip, the Iran-backed Hamas terrorist group is now trying to drag Arab Israelis and Palestinians in east Jerusalem and the West Bank into a violent confrontation with Israel.

Hamas and Iran’s mullahs will not be content until they see bloodshed and violence spread to areas outside the Gaza Strip. For them, this is a way of distracting attention from the catastrophe they brought on the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip for the past 18 months. They want the world’s attention to shift from the Gaza Strip to the West Bank, Jerusalem, and the two-million-strong community of Arab citizens inside Israel.

The good news is that Hamas’s and Iran’s efforts to expand the bloodshed and violence to Israel’s Arab community and the Palestinians in the West Bank and Jerusalem have so far been unsuccessful. The Arab Israelis and the Palestinians of the West Bank and Jerusalem see the death and destruction in the Gaza Strip and do not want to meet the same fate.

Hamas and its patrons in Tehran are undoubtedly disappointed that the Arab citizens of Israel and the Palestinians in the West Bank and east Jerusalem have not joined their jihad (holy war) in the aftermath of the October 7, 2023 Hamas-led attack on Israeli communities near the border with the Gaza Strip.

On that day, at least 1,200 Israelis were murdered and thousands injured. Another 251 Israelis were kidnapped to the Gaza Strip, where 59 – alive and dead – are still held hostage by Hamas and other terror groups.

As part of its attempt to export its jihad against Israel to other areas, Hamas issued a statement on April 16 in which it urged “our people in the West Bank, Jerusalem, and the occupied Palestinian territories [Israel] to continue their uprising against the occupation and its settlers.” Hamas promised that “the pure blood will blossom into victory and the expulsion of this occupier [Israel] from our land and our holy sites.”

Since the October 7 massacre, the vast majority of the Arab Israelis and Palestinians in the West Bank and east Jerusalem have refused to heed Hamas’s calls to join the fight against Israel. Many Arab citizens of Israel have even come out in public against the Hamas-led attack.

A poll among Arab Israelis during the first week after October 7 found that 77% of the respondents opposed the terror attack, and 85% opposed the kidnapping of civilians, which included women and children. About 53% of the respondents said that the terror attack harmed the chances of reaching a settlement between Israel and the Palestinians.

Another poll, conducted in late 2023 by the Center for Democratic Values and Institutions, in collaboration with the Viterbi Family Center for Public Opinion and Policy Research at the Israel Democracy Institute, found that 56% of Arab Israelis believe that the Hamas attack does not reflect Arab society and Islamic values. Another 86.5% support helping civilians in their efforts to volunteer during the Israel-Hamas war, according to the poll.

It is worth noting that 20 Arab citizens of Israel were murdered by Hamas terrorists on October 7 or by Hamas rocket launches in the ensuing days. Most of the victims were Bedouin residents who live in the south of Israel.

Several prominent Arab Israelis have strongly condemned the October 7 massacre. Louis Haj, an Arab resident of the city of Acre, social activist, and former tech executive, wrote to his fellow Jewish citizens:

“As the dimensions of these unimaginable sadistic horrors are uncovered, I ask you to believe me when I say that I want it to be clear to you, and the whole world, that we stand as your brothers, as human beings, and as citizens of the country, by your side. It is our simple and required moral and human duty to express abhorrence, to cry out loudly against unimaginable crimes. Our voice with be sharp and clear, unapologetic, unhesitant, unfaltering, without proportionality, with no ifs, ands, or buts. There are no dilemmas in the face of atrocities!”

In the West Bank and Jerusalem, most Palestinians have ignored Hamas’s repeated calls for violence against Israel. During the recent Islamic holy month of Ramadan, hundreds of thousands of Palestinians peacefully attended mass prayers at the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem. No clashes with Israeli security forces were reported during the month, much to the dismay of Hamas and Iran’s mullahs.

Hamas was undoubtedly hoping that the Palestinians in the West Bank and Jerusalem would launch a new intifada (uprising) against Israel in solidarity with the terrorist group and the residents of the Gaza Strip. That, however, did not happen. No mass demonstrations have taken place in the West Bank or Jerusalem, where most Palestinians appear to be more interested in finding work inside Israel than taking to the streets to clash with Israeli troops.

This, of course, does not mean that Hamas and Iran’s mullahs will halt their efforts to instigate violence outside the Gaza Strip. For them, it is crucial to open yet another front against Israel: especially from Israel’s Arab community and the West Bank, in addition to Gaza, Lebanon, Yemen, Syria and Iraq.

Now that the Trump administration is holding direct negotiations with Iran, it must demand that the ruling mullahs immediately stop supporting Hamas’s attempts to unleash a new wave of terrorist attacks against Israel from within Israel itself and from the West Bank.

The negotiations should not only focus on Iran’s nuclear ambitions and plans, but also its financial and military support for jihadi terrorist groups such as Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, Hezbollah and the Houthis. It is time for the Trump administration to realize that, in addition to Qatar, Iran too has tremendous influence over Hamas. Why not use it?

Khaled Abu Toameh is an award-winning journalist based in Jerusalem.