"In fact, Hamas leaders say their goal was to trigger that very response and that they're still hoping for a bigger war still. It's all part of a strategy, they say, to derail talks over Israel normalizing relations with regional powers — namely, Saudi Arabia — and draw the world's attention to the Palestinian cause.
"Hamas, these officials said, is more interested in the destruction of Israel than what it sees as the temporary hardships faced by Palestinians under Israeli bombardment....
"With the October 7 attack, Hamas revealed that it was less interested in merely governing the Gaza Strip and its more than 2 million inhabitants — some of whom protested its authoritarian rule and economic mismanagement in the weeks and years ahead of the latest war with Israel — than it was in fighting a war in the name of Palestinians everywhere.
"Hamas's goal is not to run Gaza and to bring it water and electricity and such," al-Hayya said. He credited the October 7 attack with having "woke the world up from its deep sleep" and forcing it to confront the plight of Palestinians in Gaza and the occupied West Bank, where — in recent weeks — Israelis in illegal settlements have stepped up deadly attacks on their Palestinian neighbors."
No comments:
Post a Comment