Following the October 7 pogrom and subsequent military response by the Israel Defense Force (IDF), Palestinian mega-terror outfit Hamas has intensified its propaganda activities in the South Asian region with the targets of collecting funds, inciting people against Israel and Jews and recruiting young people for joining “war against Israel”. Although Palestinian Authority and Fatah officially are trying to distance themselves from Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and other terrorist groups in Gaza, Ramallah and other cities, its “envoys” in the South Asian countries are actively participating in such notorious acts.
Recently, “Palestinian ambassador” to India Adnan Abu Al Haija in an interview to left-leaning anti-Semite newspaper The Hindu said, Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) have not achieved any military objective by carrying out bombing raids over the Gaza Strip as no major leader of Hamas has been harmed in these attacks and urged India to call for an immediate ceasefire as an intense humanitarian crisis has engulfed Gaza after nineteen days of Israeli bombing.
He said, “No big Hamas leader has been harmed and the only aim of Israel is to kill as many civilians as they can. They are killing Palestinian women and children as they are supported by the criminals of the Western world”.
In the interview, Abu AL Haija has accused Israel of the “ethnic cleansing” of Palestinians from the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, also saying that Palestinians will not repeat the mistakes of 1948 and 1967.
“Whatever may be the condition, we will not repeat the mistakes of 1967 and 1948 when Palestinians left home under Israeli attack. We will die if they carry out massacres but will not leave home this time. The remarks of the Jordanian king have already made it clear that the solution will not come by the removal of our population from home…”, Abu Al Haija said.
Haija further said, “Israel is not ready for an end to the conflict and will continue its bombardment as it is being supported by the US and the UK The only good Palestinian for Prime Minister Netanyahu is a dead Palestinian and left to Israel there will be no end of this conflict. If he has to kill all Palestinians, he will do that as well. This is the Israeli apartheid, criminal mindset. I call upon India and other countries to call for an immediate ceasefire so that Israel’s actions can be stopped….
“You can imagine 2.2 million people are without food, medicine, water and oxygen for 20 days. Gaza has 35 hospitals in all and they have run out of fuel that is necessary to run the facilities….”.
What Abu Al Haija did not say is – members of Hamas and other terrorist groups in Gaza have taken shelter inside hospitals and mosques, while they are using children and women as human shields.
Criticizing the United States and Western countries, Abu Al Hajja said, “The West has been silent despite witnessing the destruction that Gaza has been subjected to over the last 20 days arguing that the West has lost the moral authority to talk about killings, be it in Ukraine or elsewhere.
“The Western attitude to Israel reminds me as if the Israeli blood is blue and we Palestinians have dirty water in our veins. But the West should remember that without ensuring rights and peace for the Palestinian people, there will not be any peace in the West Asian region…”.
According to a credible source, “Palestinian ambassador” to India Adnan Abu Al Haija has been collecting donations for “Gaza victims” which subsequently may be sent to Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas or terrorist kingpins in Gaza. He also reportedly encouraged Indian Muslims in organizing anti-Israel, anti-US and anti-Jew demonstrations in “all the major cities” and also to join war against Israel”.
The source further said, wealthy Muslims in India are secretly donating hundreds of thousands of dollars for “Palestinian cause” through Abu Al Haija and other officials at “Palestinian embassy” in New Delhi.
In Bangladesh, “Palestinian ambassador” Yousef SY Ramadan hosted 15 of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) member states’ ambassadors and chargé d’Affaires who expressed solidarity and support for the people of Palestine and their legitimate struggle against the “Zionist occupation”.
At the same time, at the invitation of Ramadan, thousands of young Bangladeshis also attended the gathering for the same reason and chanted anti-Israel, anti-Jew and anti-US slogans.
Meanwhile, according to Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI), Hamas leader Khaled Mash’al and his special representative to Pakistan Dr. Naji Zuhair told the Mufti Mehmood Conference in Pakistan that Hamas will work for the implementation of Sharia rule not just in Palestine but all over the world, that Hamas is gaining successes both on the ground and at the international level, and that “Israeli Jews will be expelled from Palestine”.
The Mufti Mehmood Conference was held on October 14, 2023, in Peshawar city in Pakistan by the Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-Fazl (JUI-F), a religious organization and political party that was part of the coalition government headed by former Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif. The JUI-F is led by Maulana Fazlur Rehman, an Islamic religious scholar and politician. Mufti Mehmood, who died in 1980, was one of the founding members and emir of Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam and served as the chief minister of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province from 1972 to 1973.
The conference was also addressed by Pakistani politicians and Islamic religious scholars. Hamas leader Khaled Mash’al delivered his special address via video link, while his special representative Dr. Naji Zuhair also addressed the conference in Peshawar. Those who spoke on the occasion include the former Senate chairman and a leader of the Pakistan People’s Party, Mian Raza Rabbani, retired Captain Safdar of the Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz Sharif’s group), Haji Ghulam Ahmad Bilour of Awami National Party, JUI-F Secretary General Maulana Abdul Ghafoor Haideri, JUI-F Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province Emir Maulana Ataur Rahman, and others.
Addressing the conference live from Gaza, Hamas leader Khaled Mash’al thanked “the people all over Pakistan for their expressions of solidarity with the Palestinians” and said: “Al-Aqsa is the First Qibla [the direction toward which a Muslim turns to pray in Islam] of Muslims. It is the heart of Muslims.
The First Qibla is the center of our affection. Israelis have rained fire there, are bringing down mountains of atrocities and oppression, but we have been continuing jihad in a more confident manner than before”.
“We will not allow Americans and agents of Israel to occupy Palestine. We will watch over First Qibla. We will march further and enforce the Sharia of Muhammad, peace be upon him, on this earth”, Khalid Mash’al told the conference, according to a report in the Urdu daily Roznama Dunya.
According to another report in the Urdu daily Roznama Express, Khalid Mash’al praised JUI-F, whose constitution includes a clause on the “love of Palestine” and said: “We are extremely opposed to the Zionist Israel and do not accept it under any conditions. Palestine is the land of Muslim Umma that Hazrat Umar [the second Islamic caliph] conquered. We have been given the duty to protect this land and will not take a step back. Israel’s defeat and Palestine’s victory is assured…”
Dr. Najir Zuhair, a senior Hamas leader and special representative of Khaled Mash’al who is visiting Pakistan to hold meetings with Pakistani leaders, also addressed the Peshawar conference. Zuhair said: “There is trust in Allah that the victory will be ours. Palestine is the land of the Muslim Ummah, nobody else’s. Allah has chosen us for its protection; the victory will be ours one day. We have pledged that we will expel the unpious Israel from Palestine. Israeli Jews have no right to this land”.
The Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI) in another report said, appearing on October 24, 2023, issue 214 of the Al-Somood monthly magazine, released in Arabic by the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan (the Afghan Taliban), focuses on the ongoing war between Israel and Hamas, launched by the militant Palestinian group in an October 7 surprise attack against the Jewish state.
The 42-page magazine contains an editorial comparing the Palestinian struggle to the Taliban’s twenty-year jihad against the US and calling all Muslims to participate in the jihad against Israel; a “Message to the People of Gaza” copied from the Al-Arab Blog, glorifying those who took part in the October 7 assault and predicting that Israel will be eliminated within five years; a religious article asserting that waging jihad against Jews is greater than other forms of jihad; and a poster on the back cover stressing the importance of the Palestinian cause.
The one-page editorial claims that the “aggression of the Zionist occupation against the Palestinian people, particularly in Gaza”, has reached “a level of savagery and cruelty unmatched by the fiercest predators of the world”. Noting that the Hamas-affiliated Health Ministry in Gaza claimed (as of the writing of the editorial) more than 4,500 killed and over 13,000 wounded in Israeli bombings, it accuses Israel of conducting a “genocidal war” in Gaza, in which it “intentionally targets children, infants, pregnant women, and the wounded in hospitals,” as well as annihilating entire neighborhoods in airstrikes. This “viciousness in shedding blood” attests to the degree of “the Zionist occupation’s domination, not just over Palestine but also over the countries of the region and the entire world,” adding that “purifying the blessed land […] from the filth of the occupation is an urgent necessity” and describing the “Zionists” as “invading occupiers of a land that was never theirs and will never be – Allah willing”.
The editorial accuses the “Zionist occupiers” of “playing with world opinion” by propagating the “ridiculous idea” that “the Palestinian resistance and the Palestinian people are two separate things” and that the actions of the former are the reason for Israel’s measures against Palestinians. Comparing this narrative to the one spread by the “American occupation in Afghanistan” to justify its actions, the Taliban magazine asserts that “the Palestinian citizen is killed, displaced, and has his home demolished […] in Gaza, the West Bank, or Jerusalem, both after the emergence of the Islamic Resistance and beforehand”; the editorial warns against believing the Jews, stating that “Allah has informed you […] in His noble Book about their falsehood, treachery, perfidy, and killing of the prophets”.
