Hamas Official: We Should Learn Lessons - Not Delude Ourselves That We Won the War

Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI)
August 24, 2009, No. 2502

Senior Hamas official Ghazi Hamad, who in the past has not been reticent in criticizing his movement, wrote in a July 1, 2009 article on paltoday.com that the Arabs and Palestinians must stop depicting their defeats as victories — referring primarily to Hamas's claim that it won the December 2008 Gaza war. Hamad also called on the Arabs to establish investigative commissions like Israel does. [www.paltoday.com, July 1, 2009]

The following are excerpts from his article:

"We Act out of a Partisan Strategy"

"It is always important to call things by their name, so that we do not blindly follow pompous slogans, fall victim to illusions, and then be shocked by reality. We really want victory over Israel. [We want] to defeat this hateful occupation and see it in retreat, under siege, and obliterated — but we want the facts and figures to speak for themselves.

"We do not want emotions and pompous slogans to push aside and take the place of facts, robbing them of their power to persuade [us] and to change the painful reality. Emotion and excitement, slogans, raucous voices, and rallies cannot create real victory — [only] an illusory victory.

"[We should remember] that Israel is not a weak state, but a state with material means, intelligence apparatuses, and international support, and it can handle many challenges. Thus, dealing with it demands immense effort, precise planning, and persistent activity, proportionate to the degree of danger [it poses].

"The need is not for improvisation or for [mere] reaction, because this path gives Israel supremacy in most arenas of the military and political conflict. It is clear that since its establishment, Israel has taken a permanent strategy (about which there is no dispute among Israel's political parties, despite the differences in their [political] inclinations). We, in contrast, act out of a partisan strategy, the main point of which is contradiction and bitter quarrels, not reconciliation or cooperation.

"For many decades, the Arabs have consistently made the mistake of falling for illusions. They deceived themselves and blindly followed nationalist slogans, raucous voices, and false justifications — until every claim to unity and steadfastness collapsed, and then all their strongholds and citadels collapsed [as well]."

We Called Our Defeats Victories

"...For years, we have been in a state of loss, living a life of illusory victory, until the small young state [Israel] dared to occupy Palestine, from the sea to the river. Then it bit off all of the Sinai, stole the Golan Heights from Syria, stole Lebanon's south, and stole part of Jordan's territory. Then, it destroyed the nuclear reactor in Iraq, and even infiltrated Tunisia by sea in order to harm the PLO leaders. Israel is still sowing mayhem and carrying out evil deeds.

"[All this time], we boasted of our glory and listened to raucous songs and revolutionary speeches that intoxicated us with the ecstasy of victory. Even when we sobered up and tasted the bitterness of reality, we became drunk on the song 'Where Are the Millions' [about the Arabs' failure to help the Palestinians].

To read the rest of the article, go to: http://www.memri.org/bin/latestnews.cgi?ID=SD250209