Noted Muslims Condemn Hamas As israel Continues To Seek Release Of Hostages
JERUSALEM — The swelling number of Islamic clerics and Middle Eastern politicians and thinkers condemning Hamas continues to grow since the Oct. 7 attacks against Israel.
Canadian-based imam was the latest to do so. Tariq Abdulhaleem called for Hamas’ leadership to be prosecuted for facilitating what he called “genocide in Gaza,” the Jerusalem-based Middle East Media Research Institute reported on Feb. 1 in its weekly Jihad and Terrorism Threat Monitor.
“If there were any justice, Hamas leaders would be tried for enabling genocide In Gaza,” the Cairo-born cleric, 75, said in a Telegram post on Jan. 31.
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The cross-border attack on Israel “paved the way for genocide in Gaza,” wrote the sheikh, who became an advocate of violent jihad during his youth in Egypt. He subsequently became a supporter of al-Qaeda.
“If there were any justice, wisdom, and insight, [Yihya] Sinwar and the Hamas leadership would all be tried on charges of paving the way for genocide in Gaza.”
In Abdulhaleem’s view, Hamas did not properly consider the “capabilities, resources, and partners” that were necessary to execute the attack. As a result, the attack has come at the expense of “all of Palestine.”
It was “an incident which has cost all of Palestine, displacing a quarter of its population and killing tens of thousands of its people without any real, tangible result on the ground,” he noted, adding that there had been “no release of prisoners, no liberation of Jerusalem, no preservation of Al-Aqsa, no lifting of the siege on Gaza, not even a two-state solution, nor recognition of the right of return — not anything at all excerpt for the losses which would be expected from an attack of this size to destroy the [Gaza] strip entirely.”
Abdulhaleem further blamed the invasion’s failure on Hamas’ regional backer Iran and its Lebanese proxy Hezbollah, which “abandoned them” after Oct. 7.
“The dogs of the deceivers,” he said of Hamas, “continue to thank Persian Iran and the party of the Gods [Hezbollah], who abandoned them and embarrassed them! May Allah bring you together with those you love.”
Abdulhaleem established the Dar al-Arqam mosque in Mississauga, just west of Toronto, after settling in Canada in the late 1980s. The Islamic center is popular with the city’s ex-pat Palestinian community. In 1998, he began teaching a course in sharia law in cooperation with the American Open University. He also edited Ummat Al-Islam, a periodical that appears in both Arabic and English, for several years in Toronto.
There has been a growing chorus in recent months and weeks of Muslim leaders — from clerics to politicians to writers — who have condemned Hamas for the attacks and the taking of hostages. In a related matter, Lebanese pro-federalism activist Alfred Riachi called for Hamas leaders to be expelled from his country.
“Why are they here? They are jeopardizing Lebanon's security and citizens,” Riachi, the secretary general of the Continual Federal Congress, said in a Jan. 3 interview with “Lebanon On” on YouTube.
When the interviewer asked him about a recent X post by Racha Itani, the general coordinator of his organization, calling to expel Hamas leaders from Lebanon, Riachi responded: “We denounce any military or intelligence operation that violates Lebanon's sovereignty. The sovereignty of the Lebanese state has been violated by several parties, not just by Israel. At the same time, however, I do not understand what these people are doing here. We have had enough suffering, enough of our collapsed economy, enough troubles and enough victims. Their presence here jeopardizes Lebanon's security and citizens.”
Similarly, Palestinian writer Majdi Abd Al-Wahhab accused Hamas of wasting its resources in a hopeless war against the numerically superior Israel Defense.
In two recent articles on the Saudi-based website Elaph, the Palestinian writer harshly criticized Hamas, stating the Oct. 7 attacks brought nothing but disaster upon the Palestinian people. In one article, from Jan. 9, Abd Al-Wahhab wrote he hoped Allah will curse Hamas for the devastation it has brought upon the Gaza Strip. The vast sums wasted on digging military tunnels and launching a hopeless war against Israel should have been invested in developing infrastructure in the Gaza Strip, he said.
He assessed the destruction of Gaza “will be followed by [people] fleeing, migrating and living in misery and suffering, both in the Strip and outside it, and whoever does not become a refugee [in his homeland], will migrate.”
In an article from this past Dec. 26, Abd Al-Wahhab called the attack a “kamikaze” operation, like those of the Japanese pilots in World War II, which, he said, did nothing to help Japan’s war effort at the time. He urged Hamas to learn from the experience of the Japanese and renounce its pointless military action.
In addition, he called on the international community and the Arab world to act to eliminate all the Palestinian organizations and stop their military and civilian activity, “so that the Palestinians will be rid of them and their harm and can start blazing a new, straight path for themselves, far from destruction, killing and devastation.”
Comments by Abd Al-Wahhab, Riachi and Abdulhaleem come as protests against Hamas’ Islamic dictatorship continues in the devastated streets of Gaza. While locals were initially euphoric about the terror organization’s success on Oct. 7 in surprising Israel with a bloody cross-border invasion that included massacring 1,200 Israelis and other nationals, and seizing some 256 hostages, the ensuing four-month-long war has seen the IDF capture Gaza City and tighten its noose on Khan Yunis, the coastal enclave’s second-largest city.
The IDF estimates that it has killed some 10,000 Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad fighters. Speaking on Monday, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said Hamas’ leadership is losing its ability to effectively coordinate its remaining forces on the ground, and that 18 of the terrorist group’s 24 battalions no longer have their command structure in place. The remaining guerillas are fighting in isolation without any coordinated strategy.
The number of civilians killed remains unclear. Though Hamas and PIJ militants wear uniforms at parades, they walk about Gaza’s streets in civilian clothes. Spotting an opportunity to ambush IDF soldiers, they retrieve their hidden guns and attack. Many observers question the combined number of civilian and military casualties – more than 27,000 – claimed by Hamas’s Ministry of Health.
Though stalled ceasefire talks are being held in Cairo earlier this week, Israeli Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu has vowed to pursue the war’s twin goals of releasing the hostages and toppling the Hamas regime.
Netanyahu insisted on Sunday that he will not accept an agreement at “any price” — referring to a request to release thousands of Palestinian prisoners from Israeli jails or to ease military pressure in Gaza.
Gil Zohar was born in Toronto and moved to Jerusalem in 1982. He is a journalist writing for The Jerusalem Post, Segula magazine and other publications. He’s also a professional tour guide who likes to weave together the Holy Land’s multiple narratives.