In June 2014, Hamas and Fatah announced they were forming a unity government.1 This means the secular Fatah was joining with the jihadist Hamas to attempt to govern the Palestinian territories together, under the banner of the Palestinian Authority (PA). The Obama administration, within days of this announcement, pledged that the United States would continue to provide hundreds of millions of American taxpayer dollars in aid to this new terrorist government.2 The administration is pledging this aid despite the fact that U.S. criminal law clearly prohibits any material support for designated terrorist organizations like Hamas.3
Currently, the operating relationship of this new unity government is unclear. The Palestinian Authority is a larger entity with a primary role in the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, while Fatah is a more moderate political organization and Hamas is a terrorist gang.4 To draw a crude and imperfect analogy with the United States, our nation is governed by a federal government, which is—depending on the year—controlled by either the Democrats or Republicans (and sometimes control is divided). The Palestinian Authority, by contrast, has long been controlled by Fatah, with Hamas largely excluded from the PA. With the creation of the unity government, however, Hamas may now have a say in PA governance not unlike that of an American political party in governing the United States. It is not yet known what duties are delegated to which organization, how future endeavors will be orchestrated, or how the Palestinian people can trust that their goals will be pursued effectively.
What is clear, however, is this new unity agreement has not moderated Hamas, which followed the announcement of the unity government by dramatically escalating its terrorist attacks against Israel.
Hamas orchestrated the kidnapping and brutal execution of three teenagers in June 2014.5 These teenagers were shot ten times with a silenced gun.6 As follows many terrorist atrocities, the kidnapping resulted in Palestinian celebrations at a university near Ramallah.7 Palestinians were seen giving away sweets and celebrating in the streets.8
Hamas did not disclaim responsibility. Far from it. The military branch of Hamas issued a statement that said “the occupier will never have security,” without mentioning the three kidnapped teens.9 Hamas followed the kidnappings by stepping up its rocket launches into Israeli territory, firing them indiscriminately at Israeli civilians.10 Although the majority of these rockets have thankfully fallen on unoccupied ground or have been intercepted by the Israelis’ Iron Dome antimissile system,11 they are nonetheless being fired at civilians in violation of the law of war.12 In response to these rockets, Israel acted in self-defense by conducting air strikes and raids with ground troops against Hamas and other terrorist operatives in Hamas-controlled Gaza.13
Israel simply cannot negotiate with Palestinian officials who refuse to acknowledge or accept Israel’s right to exist, and who continue to support or mount attacks on Israel.
In the final analysis, until Hamas and its terrorist allies are defeated, there will be no peace with Israel. There will be continued terrorist attacks directed against Israeli civilians, attacks that violate the international law of war and constitute war crimes. The Palestinian people will be pawns in the hands of vicious terrorists and will continue to suffer the inevitable results that Hamas’s terrorist attacks invite on their own neighborhoods and families.
In the final analysis, until Hamas and its terrorist allies are defeated, there will be no peace with Israel. There will be continued terrorist attacks directed against Israeli civilians, attacks that violate the international law of war and constitute war crimes. The Palestinian people will be pawns in the hands of vicious terrorists and will continue to suffer the inevitable results that Hamas’s terrorist attacks invite on their own neighborhoods and families.
The only thing that separates the Jews of Israel from the fate of the Christians, Yazidis, and other religious minorities in Iraq and Syria is the might of the Israel Defense Forces. Faced with murderous terrorists, Israelis are able to respond with F-16s, Merkava tanks, and one of the best-trained armies in the world. In Iraq, by contrast, Christians are defenseless, Yazidis are helpless, and even America’s Muslim allies, the Kurds, are outgunned by their barbaric ISIS enemies. Tragically, our friends in Iraq are defenseless because America chose to abandon them. American air strikes designed to avert world-historic massacres may be too little and too late to preserve any semblance of Christian life in Iraq.
If self-defense is all that separates Israel from defeat and genocide—if self-defense is all that prevents jihadists from killing American allies and striking America again and again—then the U.N. and our Western allies should support the rights of Israel and America.
But they often do not. Western European governments, in cooperation with the U.N. and the international left, systematically seek to prevent Israel from defending itself, and use legal arguments that would also apply to American soldiers.
And this brings us to the next troubling phase of our battle against jihad, our battle to save Israel, America, and Christians in the Middle East from destruction and death—the legal battle to preserve America’s and Israel’s right to protect themselves.
The battle against “lawfare.”