By Stan Goodenough
Jan 26, 2006
CNN?s John Vause hurried Thursday morning to assure his worldwide audience that the stunning Hamas win in the previous day?s PA elections ?does not necessarily mean that most Palestinians [sic] support the violence of Hamas.?
Sounding as if he had already conducted a snap survey of Arab voters in the geographically disconnected areas of Judea, Samaria and Gaza although he filed his report just a couple of hours after the shocking results became known, Vause stated as if it were a fact that ?most support Hamas for its social works, [its] day care centers? and so on.
Likewise, Sky News journalist and ?Palestinian? apologist Emma Hurd stated as fact that Hamas won such massive support ?not because it threatened violence against Israel [and] not because it has promised to destroy the Jewish state, but because? most ?Palestinians? just wanted an improvement in their daily lives.
This obdurate refusal to report the truth (whether out of a desire to remain politically correct or perhaps as an act of self-preservation working among people who don?t take kindly to truth-telling journalists) is an outrageous betrayal of the trust their audiences place in these international reporters.
Let?s take just a brief look at whom and what Hamas is.
The terror group?s name is an abbreviation from the Arabic Harakat al-Muqawamah al-Islamiyyah (Islamic Resistance Movement in English).
Hamas regards the ancient land of Israel (inclusive of Israel ?proper,? Gaza, Judea and Samaria) as a sacred Islamic trust or waqf which it is forbidden ever to relinquish to non-Islamic rule.
According to its belief, it is the duty of every single Muslim to fight to ?liberate? Palestine from the perfidious Jew.
The Hamas Covenant calls for the complete and utter destruction of Israel, primarily through violence, and its replacement with an Iranian-style Islamic state run according to Sharia law.
Spawned by the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood in the 1970s, the group took root mainly in the Gaza Strip but also in parts of Judea and Samaria (the ?West Bank?) during the so-called First Intifada, initially establishing a following among the Palestinian Arabs primarily through social works and its calling for the practice of ?pure? Islam.
Ironically, Hamas? arrival was initially welcomed by Israel which, refusing to recognize the danger inherent in any Islamist group, saw the ?benign? organization as a useful counterweight to the PLO.
But while its initial popularity may have sprung from its charitable activities, membership in the organization really began to explode with its embarkation on a campaign of bloody jihad against the Jewish state.
Hamas? ?holy war? was unleashed against Israel just days after the signing of the Oslo Accords, with the September 24, 1993 killing of Yigal Vaknin by the Hamas ?military wing? Iz a-Din al-Kassam.
During the next six months the organization carried out 10 attacks before introducing the ?suicide? bomber into Israel in April 1994.
Over the ensuing years, Hamas remained consistent in its rejection of the ?peace process,? and the number of its massacres of Jews increased. Between September 2000 and March 2004, Hamas carried out 425 terrorist attacks of various kinds in which 377 Israelis were murdered and 2,076 were wounded.
Reveling in their depravity, Hamas held rallies, theater performances and exhibitions celebrating the group's slaughter of Jews in pizza restaurants, discotheques, shopping malls and on Israeli buses.
Impressed by these demonstrations of Arab courage, ?Palestinians? flocked to sign up. And according to the elections commission, Wednesday?s voter turnout stood at 77 percent, higher than participation during the first PA elections 10 years ago.
The following is a partial list of the kind of Hamas attacks that appealed to this overwhelming majority since June 2001:
June 1, 2001: ?Suicide? bombing of a Tel Aviv discotheque, in which 21 people were murdered and 120 were wounded.
August 9, 2001: ?Suicide?bombing of Jerusalem restaurant; 15 murdered, 130 wounded.
December 1, 2001: Double ?suicide? bombing on Jerusalem?s Ben Yehuda pedestrian mall; 11 people murdered, 188 wounded.
December 2, 2001: ?Suicide? bombing of Haifa bus; 15 murdered, 40 wounded.
March 9, 2002: ?Suicide? bombing of Jerusalem caf?; 11 murdered, 54 wounded.
March 27, 2002: ?Suicide? bombing of Netanya hotel on first night of Passover; 30 murdered, 140 wounded.
June 18, 2002: ?Suicide? bombing of a Jerusalem bus; 19 murdered, 74 wounded.
August 4, 2002: ?Suicide? bombing of bus at Meron junction; nine murdered, 50 wounded.
November 21, 2002: ?Suicide? bombing of a Jerusalem bus; 11 murdered, 50 wounded.
March 5, 2003: ?Suicide? bombing of Haifa bus; 17 murdered, 53 wounded.
May 17, 2003: ?Suicide? bombing in Hebron, in which two people were murdered.
May 18, 2003: ?Suicide? bombing of Jerusalem bus; seven murdered, 20 wounded.
June 11, 2003: ?Suicide? bombing of Jerusalem bus; 11 murdered, over 100 wounded.
August 19, 2003: ?Suicide? bombing of Jerusalem bus; 23 murdered, over 130 wounded.
September 9, 2003: ?Suicide? bombing of hitchhiking post near the IDF base at Tzrifin; nine murdered, 10 wounded.
September 9, 2003: ?Suicide? bombing of Jerusalem caf?; seven murdered, 70 wounded.
January 29, 2004: ?Suicide? bombing of a Jerusalem bus; 11 murdered, 44 wounded.
March 14: 2004: Double ?suicide? bombing at Ashdod port; 10 murdered, 16 wounded.
August 31, 2004: Two ?suicide? bombings on two Beersheva buses; 16 murdered, 100 wounded.
Hamas is reaping the fruits of faithfully taking the war to the people of Israel. It won on Wednesday because it opposes any kind of peaceful settlement with Israel and most of its supporters back this.
Any journalist truly interested in seeing peace come to the Middle East should have the courage to tell it like it is.