Hamas is less hypocritical than its American apologists. This is clear after listening to the cant coming from many in our colleges and Congress. Hamas has been comparatively straightforward in its hatred and intent to exterminate Israel; not so for those seeking to cover for it here at home.
In 1948, immediately after Israel declared its independence, what is today known as Gaza was used as a launching point for Egypt’s (and four other Arab nations’) attack on Israel. Despite this failed attempt to wipe out Israel, Gaza remained under Egyptian control. It was then used again in 1967’s Six-Day War — yet another attempt to destroy Israel. After this second attempt, Israel remained in Gaza. (READ MORE: Five Stupid Things the Left Would Have You Believe)
In 1988, Hamas issued its charter, which clearly laid out its intent:
This is the Charter of the Islamic Resistance (Hamas) which will reveal its face, unveil its identity, state its position, clarify its purpose, discuss its hopes, call for support to its cause and reinforcement, and for joining its ranks. For our struggle against the Jews is extremely wide-ranging and grave.
Hamas identified itself and its enemy in no uncertain terms: “Hamas is one of the links in the Chain of Jihad in the confrontation with the Zionist invasion.” And there was no mistaking its goal: “Muslims will fight the Jews (and kill them); until the Jews hide behind rocks and trees, which will cry: 0 Muslim! there is a Jew hiding behind me, come on and kill him!”
Israel’s presence in Gaza lasted roughly four decades until it withdrew in 2005. In short order, Hamas won control of Gaza’s government. In 2017, Hamas released a revised charter that, in the words of a RAND Corporation analysis at the time: “appears to soften the group’s stance toward Israel”:
The major takeaway is that Hamas is open, at least in principle, to accepting the 1967 borders of a Palestinian state—a major sticking point in previous failed negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians. Its previous position had always been to call for the destruction of the state of Israel.
Even so, the revision still contained “some of the more incendiary language of the original.”
Six years later on Oct. 7, Hamas apparently reverted to its original charter and its original intent by putting those earlier words into action. Yet some here in America continue to dispute both the words and the deeds of Hamas.
Early in the conflict they called for a ceasefire. They did not, however, call for one immediately — when Hamas was still conducting its prolonged terrorist attack. What came immediately were instead supposedly pro-Palestinian rallies, such as the one in New York on Oct. 8 that was organized by none other than the New York City chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) — the party that includes Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) and Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-N.Y.), both members of the Squad (more about this far-left House group later). This pro-Palestine rally included the burning of an Israeli flag and a rally attender displaying a swastika on his cell phone.
On Oct. 16, several members of the far-left House group known as the Squad introduced a resolution calling for a ceasefire. It would be interesting to know if the ceasefire they imagine would look anything like what existed on Oct. 6 — before Hamas broke it with a hideous terrorist attack targeting Israeli citizens.
Does the ceasefire they imagine require Hamas to first release the hostages it had taken? Interestingly, the Squad members’ resolution makes no mention of the Israeli hostages Hamas took. Does it envision Hamas turning over the terrorists who committed the atrocities in Israel? These would all seem to be reasonable preliminary steps of a party now seeking ceasefire.
These apologists certainly profess concern about civilian casualties. But do they in any way blame Hamas for these — first for the innocent civilians that were its deliberate and premeditated targets in Israel and second for the innocent civilians that are its deliberate and premeditated collateral damage in Gaza? By embedding its terrorist infrastructure deeply in and around civilian targets, Hamas knew exactly what it was doing to the human shields it was using. And Hamas has used them in other instances for some time.
What those calling for a ceasefire in Congress and on campuses are seeking can be fairly ascertained from a video that Tlaib released, in which she included protesters chanting “from the river to the sea.” The river is, of course, the Jordan River, and the sea is the Mediterranean. What lies between these two points, Tlaib? Israel.
Despite Talib’s hollow claims that the chant is “an aspirational call for freedom, human rights, and peaceful coexistence, not death, destruction, or hate,” from the river to the sea leaves no place for Israel. The chant is nothing more than the Hamas charter simplified into a slogan. It is not surprising that the House voted to censure Tlaib, but it is appalling that 188 members voted against it and four could only vote “Present.”
There have always been what the Bolsheviks once called “useful idiots” — those people who repeated the rhetoric and propaganda of liars bent on evil. While the two may seem but two sides of the same counterfeit coin, there is ultimately a forthrightness in the liar. Liars’ actions become their admission. There is a truthfulness in liars’ deeds that never exists in pure hypocrites — those who continue to insist that the lie is the truth and that what happened did not.
Hamas has made itself clear — an admission by atrocity — that it is who it said it was from the beginning. In contrast, its American apologists are still trying to obfuscate. They are still speaking the old, and now disproven, lies; still calling for our actions to respond to those lies.
America’s Hamas apologists are not the greater evil, but they are clearly the greater hypocrites. And, apparently, they imagine us the greater fools.
J.T. Young was a professional staffer in the House and Senate from 1987–2000, served in the Department of Treasury and Office of Management and Budget from 2001–2004, and was director of government relations for a Fortune 20 company from 2004–2023.