Israel-Palestinian Conflict: It's Not About Land

"Palestine is a legitimate theatre of operations for jihad (holy war)"
Mohsen al-Awajy, Saudi religious scholar

Who says Hamas lost the war?

In a hall crowded with conservative Sunni Muslim sheikhs and scholars, in a hotel close to Istanbul's Ataturk Airport speaker after speaker called for jihad against Israel in support of Hamas.

...The conference, dubbed the Global Anti-Aggression Campaign, also gave impetus to Sunni clerics concerned about the growing power of Hezbollah, the Shia movement backed by Iran, which rose to international prominence in its own war with Israel in 2006.

"Gaza is a gift," the Saudi religious scholar Mohsen al-Awajy told me. He and other delegates repeatedly referred to the Gaza war as "a victory".

"Gaza," he continued, "gives us power, it solves our differences. We are all now in a unified front against Zionism."

In closed meetings after sessions delegates focussed on the creation of a "third Jihadist front" - the first two being Afghanistan and Iraq. The intensity of the Israeli attack had "awakened all Muslims," Mr Awajy claimed.

Where else can you have a meeting to wage Jihad and entitle it "the Global Anti-Aggression Campaign"? Then again, to claim that you are openning a third front and compare it to Iraq does not give the impression that this meeting was heavily based on reality.

And there was the obligatory call for martyrdom by a leader of Hamas who lives in Syria:

Mohammed Nazzal, a senior Hamas leader based in Damascus, challenged Arab governments to "open their borders and allow the fighters to come."

Delegates from all over the Middle East, and from Somalia, Sudan, Pakistan and Indonesia applauded as he stabbed the air with a raised finger and declared: "There will be no agreement with Israel... only weapons will bring respect."

Mr Nazzal told his audience: "Don't worry about casualties." [emphasis added]

That may be the motto of Hamas, but Gazans are not as taken with it as they once were--no wonder the leaders of Hamas is looking for new volunteers.

More at Memeorandum

Technorati Tag: Israel and Gaza and Hamas and Operation Cast Lead.