These are facts. Of course you can find a few distraught people who blame Hamas, but they are simply not representative of the Gaza population at large, any more than hardline Jews who want to nuke Gaza represent Israelis at large. Regardless of how badly Western media (incl Free Press apparently) would like to believe, Gazans overwhelmingly support Hamas.
The images of slaughtered and mutilated Israelis -- especially women -- being dragged through the streets of Gaza City while the residents took turns beating, spitting on, and throwing rocks at them flies in the face of this propaganda. Hamas is Gaza, Gaza is Hamas.
When historians did research on Germany, they found evidence that the vast majority of German citizens knew what was going on, and supported it. They benefitted from the enslavement of people and were able to have more leisure time. They benefitted in profit from slave labor in their businesses. It's hard to believe that the Gaza people don't overwhelmingly support Hamas, or at least the goals of Hamas.
“Hamas won Gaza elections.” No, they did not. They won exactly one election (in 2006). One man, one vote, one time. Hitler also won a single election and, like Hamas, attacked his neighbor. Hmmm…. how did that work out for Germany?
In the West Bank Mahoud Abbas was elected in 2005. He is now in the 18th year of his four-year term. I wonder if this electoral track record has anything to do with the Palestinians stagnation and present plight?
I'll rephrase. Hamas won the last election held in Gaza. All evidence indicates they would win any new election called today.
Your reference to Germany is interesting in light of Jeff's comment above. Many Germans at least tacitly supported the persecution of the Jews. Did they know everything going on at Bergen Belsen and Auschwitz? Of course not. But they knew that Jews were being marginalized, and many middle-class+ Germans found a class of near serfs quite useful. When the Allies won the war, many of these people were tried as collaborators, and rightly so.
I wouldn't go as far as Jeff does in saying that "Hamas is Gaza and Gaza is Hamas", but his sentiment and mine are the same, and he's more correct than not.
Sounds like media whitewash of Hamas supporters in Gaza. Reliable polling from a Palestinian institute in Ramallah show 78% of Palestinians support the Oct 7 atrocities:
Have you read/listened to Whispered in Gaza? Do you know what Hamas does to people it considers disloyal? Did you see the photo of the beheaded suspected informants hung by a crane?
Who knows what the actual support for the totalitarian regime is, particularly when you are risking death to go against it.
22% can form a kernel of the population to work with. It is amazing how popular support can shift and alter once people taste actual freedom. No one says that peace will be easy to achieve once Hamas's power is destroyed. However, if people can use the lessons from post war Germany, Hamas and the death cult it inspires can be defeated.
If this is the case, why do they feel like a foreign power committed to establishing law and order without a terrorist cabal in charge is "occupation" and living life under Hamas is not "occupation"
1. If they are living in Gaza, they will most likely use the terminology that Hamas proscribes.
2. They have been taught for several generations a skewed view of events, one which absolves the Arab leaders of all blame. (Martin Gilbert's Israel is interesting on how in 1948 the Arab leaders encouraged the ordinary Palestinians to flee and indeed did the runaway instead of standing and fighting thing which seems to be so prevalent in the Middle East . You can also get this from Robert Fiske's early 1990s book on Palestine. Fiske was pro-Palestinian). I recently watched a BBC programme with Rob Rinder which also had people from the Palestinian diaspora returning to find out about their heritage. Because I know a bit about the Ottoman Empire and that area, it was interesting to see the reaction of one woman to being told that her ancestor had been the 'strong man' in the village. She appeared delighted with the concept. It is very much -- we were not to blame, we are not always refugees, it was someone else who was v wicked did this and once we all played happily amongst the orange groves of Jaffa idealization. (NB you can get the same in Scotland or indeed anywhere where there is this movement for independence. )
3. Some people fear change and want to believe Hamas's lies but are really just hoping everything goes away and they can just live somehow in dignity.
4. Some people want a wise and just Palestinian leader to rise up and create this ideal world (how they are not certain, just praying for a miracle) and show that the Palestinians can stand and prosper. Hamas first got a toehold because of the corruption of Fattah. The Palestinians have been unlucky in their leaders. I understand Salam Fayyad is considered decent but lost power due to corruption within his government. There must be more like him.
5. It is possible to loathe more than one thing at a time. One of the videos above has a man saying that he is praying for the destruction of Hamas, even if the agent of the destruction is the Jew. But they don't really want Israel to rule over them as they have been told that they will be treated as 2nd class citizens.
My personal view is that once Hamas is destroyed, there should be a protectorate and an undertaking by that protectorate that no offensive action will be taken (much as you have in Japan and indeed post war Germany) It takes a long time to dismantle a militarized society and to allow leaders dedicated to peace to emerge. I thought Bari Weiss' interview with Condeleeza Rice in October was good. Hilary Clinton's article in the Atlantic said much the same thing. Israel's policy of containment (encouraged by the US it must be said) has failed and a new approach must be tried but first Hamas must be dismantled.
"Please take your own opinions and that's all they are somewhere else, no one needs them here"
A surprisingly Orwellian comment for a substack titled "The Free Press".
Perhaps they point to your urgent need to read comments you disagree with and learn to debate them in a rational manner, rather than pushing for self-censorship?
Read the article: the poll surveyed Palestinians in southern Gaza and the West Bank.
While both are authoritarian, the West Bank, as you know, is ruled by the Palestinian Authority, a fierce rival of Hamas. Residents there will be under pressure *not* to support Hamas, so the poll results are even more striking.
To maintain statistical accuracy, about 60% of poll subjects would have been in the West Bank.
I haven't watched the Voices from Gaza yet, but I look forward to it.
One confusion here that I think needs to be cleared up: the Gazans can (and mostly do, I suspect) hate both Hamas and Israel. So support of the October 7th atrocities does not equal support of Hamas. Also, Gazans are a subset of Palestinians, and so I'd like to know what fraction of that survey represents Gazans.
I know it was an eye-opener for me about the conditions the ordinary citizens endure. The videos about the Arab folk dancer and the aspiring journalist concentrated my mind. Once you realise that anyone professional in Gaza owes their living to Hamas and Hamas like Iran does target relatives in Gaza of Palestinians who are overseas, things do become clearer. So Layla Moran, a British Lib-Dem MP who is also Palestinian has no problem with criticizing Hamas but then she has no relatives in Gaza.
Read the article: the poll surveyed Palestinians in southern Gaza and the West Bank.
While both are authoritarian, the West Bank, as you know, is ruled by the Palestinian Authority, a fierce rival of Hamas. Residents there will be under pressure *not* to support Hamas, so the poll results are even more striking.
To maintain statistical accuracy, about 60% of poll subjects would have been in the West Bank.
The poll mentioned below was carried out by an outfit from Birzeit University in Ramallah. The results used to be readily accessible through their website at:
I was able to access the results tables in English a couple of weeks ago and have a copy of them, but, interestingly, they no longer have them available in English in their webpage, only in Arabic. Instead they have a sort of breakdown analysis that essentially leaves unmentioned some of the most inconvenient results that are emphasized in the press articles referred to in the comments below.
From the results tables it becomes clear that, in a nutshell, only 7% of Gazans like Hamas's government, but 2/3 to 3/4 of them support Hamas's aims & strategies vis-a-vis Israel, including 70% support for a single Palestinian state "From the River to the Sea". Hence the question as to whether Hamas represents the Palestinians in Gaza is somewhat misleading.
Many of us would have wished the picture looked a bit more hopeful for a future peaceful compromise. But, let's face it, it's not the case.
Had Sherman only known of Scarlett O’Hara’s indifference to the Confederate cause, Atlanta needn’t have burned!
The level of popular support among Gazans for the genocidal aims of their rulers is a red herring, unknowable and irrelevant to Israel’s conduct of the war. Those not in the fight cannot be killed at random, but nor does their presence obligate Israel to pursue anything less than complete and durable elimination of Gaza’s will and capacity to threaten Israeli citizens.
As the real Sherman said, “we cannot change the hearts and minds of the South, but we can make war so terrible that generations would pass away before they would again appeal to it.”
I have no doubt that Gazans have been suppressed and used by Hamas for its grizzly war to terrorize Israelis. However Israel has to destroy Hamas and war is messy. Once Hamas is uprooted the world will see if there are any of these peace desiring Gazans who can become leaders of their people.
My Jewish friend in Israel said Hamas won the election in Gaza violently. This is about Hamas vs. Israel not Palestinians vs. Israel. My friend is a supporter of the Palestinians, has friends who are Palestinian and speaks Arabic and Hebrew. I've known him for 16 years, I believe what he tells me.
A free press demanding some version of free speech is vital. It is not even close to a human reality unfortunately. Thank you to The Free Press for trying. Gift subscriptions will be part of my contribution to the world.
The average Palestinian trying to live their life in Gaza is just another victim of Hamas. This attack had no potential upside for the normal people living in Gaza whatsoever, it was an antisemitic terror attack meant to provoke exactly the response it provoked. The Palestinians are pawns in all this.
The world does not seem to have a solution to combat religious fundamentalism in the middle east, though. The Palestinians need a legitimate government who watches out for their interests, but Hamas would never permit that.
If the Gazans are so sick of Hamas, this seems like a good time to denounce them and point them out. I’m not seeing that. Maybe they don’t trust all those UN Do-Gooders to protect them. But this is their time. This is their chance for freedom. Yes Hamas will slaughter some of them, but a prolonged war will kill more. At least this way they will be True Palestinian Heroes. Gazans, do you want freedom and a better life? This.Is.Your.Chance.
Anti Hamas? I don’t think so. The people in Gaza were shown rejoicing and dancing in the streets on October 7th, when they first learned of the terrorist attack on Israel. They also beat the hostages when Hamas marched them through the streets of Gaza. The people of Gaza, like most people around the world, hate the Jews, and they support Hamas since Hamas stated purpose is to rid the land, once known as Judea, of Jews.
It’s obvious that the people who agreed to speak do not represent a majority opinion of the people living in Gaza. If they did, then the moderate Palestinians would rise up and overthrow Hamas’ leaders. The people in Gaza were shown rejoicing in the streets when they learned of the October 7th terrorist attack against Israeli citizens. There are also documented reports of hostages being beaten by Gazan citizens as they were dragged through the streets of Gaza.
I'm tired of these anecdotes. Hamas is broadly supported throughout Gaza and the West Bank. Hamas won Gaza elections. Abbas refuses to call West bank elections because all polling indicates he would lose to Hamas. Since Oct 7th, support for Hamas has increased in both territories. (https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/palestinian-poll-finds-strong-support-for-hamas-october-7-attacks-river-to-the-sea-state/ar-AA1k6mEx).
These are facts. Of course you can find a few distraught people who blame Hamas, but they are simply not representative of the Gaza population at large, any more than hardline Jews who want to nuke Gaza represent Israelis at large. Regardless of how badly Western media (incl Free Press apparently) would like to believe, Gazans overwhelmingly support Hamas.
The images of slaughtered and mutilated Israelis -- especially women -- being dragged through the streets of Gaza City while the residents took turns beating, spitting on, and throwing rocks at them flies in the face of this propaganda. Hamas is Gaza, Gaza is Hamas.
When historians did research on Germany, they found evidence that the vast majority of German citizens knew what was going on, and supported it. They benefitted from the enslavement of people and were able to have more leisure time. They benefitted in profit from slave labor in their businesses. It's hard to believe that the Gaza people don't overwhelmingly support Hamas, or at least the goals of Hamas.
“Hamas won Gaza elections.” No, they did not. They won exactly one election (in 2006). One man, one vote, one time. Hitler also won a single election and, like Hamas, attacked his neighbor. Hmmm…. how did that work out for Germany?
In the West Bank Mahoud Abbas was elected in 2005. He is now in the 18th year of his four-year term. I wonder if this electoral track record has anything to do with the Palestinians stagnation and present plight?
I'll rephrase. Hamas won the last election held in Gaza. All evidence indicates they would win any new election called today.
Your reference to Germany is interesting in light of Jeff's comment above. Many Germans at least tacitly supported the persecution of the Jews. Did they know everything going on at Bergen Belsen and Auschwitz? Of course not. But they knew that Jews were being marginalized, and many middle-class+ Germans found a class of near serfs quite useful. When the Allies won the war, many of these people were tried as collaborators, and rightly so.
I wouldn't go as far as Jeff does in saying that "Hamas is Gaza and Gaza is Hamas", but his sentiment and mine are the same, and he's more correct than not.
Sounds like media whitewash of Hamas supporters in Gaza. Reliable polling from a Palestinian institute in Ramallah show 78% of Palestinians support the Oct 7 atrocities:
https://www.jns.org/three-in-four-palestinians-support-hamass-massacre/
But still let the mainstream media pro-Hamas PR campaign begin?
Have you read/listened to Whispered in Gaza? Do you know what Hamas does to people it considers disloyal? Did you see the photo of the beheaded suspected informants hung by a crane?
Who knows what the actual support for the totalitarian regime is, particularly when you are risking death to go against it.
22% can form a kernel of the population to work with. It is amazing how popular support can shift and alter once people taste actual freedom. No one says that peace will be easy to achieve once Hamas's power is destroyed. However, if people can use the lessons from post war Germany, Hamas and the death cult it inspires can be defeated.
If this is the case, why do they feel like a foreign power committed to establishing law and order without a terrorist cabal in charge is "occupation" and living life under Hamas is not "occupation"
There are probably a number of reasons.
1. If they are living in Gaza, they will most likely use the terminology that Hamas proscribes.
2. They have been taught for several generations a skewed view of events, one which absolves the Arab leaders of all blame. (Martin Gilbert's Israel is interesting on how in 1948 the Arab leaders encouraged the ordinary Palestinians to flee and indeed did the runaway instead of standing and fighting thing which seems to be so prevalent in the Middle East . You can also get this from Robert Fiske's early 1990s book on Palestine. Fiske was pro-Palestinian). I recently watched a BBC programme with Rob Rinder which also had people from the Palestinian diaspora returning to find out about their heritage. Because I know a bit about the Ottoman Empire and that area, it was interesting to see the reaction of one woman to being told that her ancestor had been the 'strong man' in the village. She appeared delighted with the concept. It is very much -- we were not to blame, we are not always refugees, it was someone else who was v wicked did this and once we all played happily amongst the orange groves of Jaffa idealization. (NB you can get the same in Scotland or indeed anywhere where there is this movement for independence. )
3. Some people fear change and want to believe Hamas's lies but are really just hoping everything goes away and they can just live somehow in dignity.
4. Some people want a wise and just Palestinian leader to rise up and create this ideal world (how they are not certain, just praying for a miracle) and show that the Palestinians can stand and prosper. Hamas first got a toehold because of the corruption of Fattah. The Palestinians have been unlucky in their leaders. I understand Salam Fayyad is considered decent but lost power due to corruption within his government. There must be more like him.
5. It is possible to loathe more than one thing at a time. One of the videos above has a man saying that he is praying for the destruction of Hamas, even if the agent of the destruction is the Jew. But they don't really want Israel to rule over them as they have been told that they will be treated as 2nd class citizens.
My personal view is that once Hamas is destroyed, there should be a protectorate and an undertaking by that protectorate that no offensive action will be taken (much as you have in Japan and indeed post war Germany) It takes a long time to dismantle a militarized society and to allow leaders dedicated to peace to emerge. I thought Bari Weiss' interview with Condeleeza Rice in October was good. Hilary Clinton's article in the Atlantic said much the same thing. Israel's policy of containment (encouraged by the US it must be said) has failed and a new approach must be tried but first Hamas must be dismantled.
In short it is complicated.
I am a bit confused by your comment. This piece is clearly anti-Hamas and those interviewed explicitly call for Hamas’s destruction.
Pointing out that a Palestinian polling source shows support for Hamas is likely the very propaganda you and I both seek to avoid.
The takeaway here is that those who claim to support Palestinians lives are not listening to the people who want Hamas removed from power.
I find it's trying to whitewash Palestinian support for Hamas.
A poll conducted by a Palestinian institute is not propaganda: it's an effort to get an accurate snapshot of Palestinian public opinion.
A collection of anecdotal interviews, carefully chosen for their message, that's propaganda.
Doesn't really matter. Eventually there will be no Hamas to support.
Please take your own opinions and that's all they are somewhere else, no one needs them here
"Please take your own opinions and that's all they are somewhere else, no one needs them here"
A surprisingly Orwellian comment for a substack titled "The Free Press".
Perhaps they point to your urgent need to read comments you disagree with and learn to debate them in a rational manner, rather than pushing for self-censorship?
Exactly the wrong response.
The authors of this piece on TFP interviewed people in Gaza.
It’s entirely possible that the subset they talked to truly wants Hamas gone and there still might be 75% support for Hamas actions.
It’s likely impossible to be sure either way.
“A poll conducted by a Palestinian institute is not propaganda.” No, it’s just as accurate as a poll in 1937 asking Germans if they oppose Hitler.
Read the article: the poll surveyed Palestinians in southern Gaza and the West Bank.
While both are authoritarian, the West Bank, as you know, is ruled by the Palestinian Authority, a fierce rival of Hamas. Residents there will be under pressure *not* to support Hamas, so the poll results are even more striking.
To maintain statistical accuracy, about 60% of poll subjects would have been in the West Bank.
I haven't watched the Voices from Gaza yet, but I look forward to it.
One confusion here that I think needs to be cleared up: the Gazans can (and mostly do, I suspect) hate both Hamas and Israel. So support of the October 7th atrocities does not equal support of Hamas. Also, Gazans are a subset of Palestinians, and so I'd like to know what fraction of that survey represents Gazans.
You can also read the essays about Whispered in Gaza from Jan 2023. They were published as a 3 parter. https://www.timesofisrael.com/whats-life-like-under-hamas-whispered-in-gaza-offers-unique-courageous-testimony/
I know it was an eye-opener for me about the conditions the ordinary citizens endure. The videos about the Arab folk dancer and the aspiring journalist concentrated my mind. Once you realise that anyone professional in Gaza owes their living to Hamas and Hamas like Iran does target relatives in Gaza of Palestinians who are overseas, things do become clearer. So Layla Moran, a British Lib-Dem MP who is also Palestinian has no problem with criticizing Hamas but then she has no relatives in Gaza.
Either your reading skills are impaired or you’re just trying to sow division. Either way, nobody’s buying that s**t here.
Polls suck at the best of times. We’re supposed to believe those conducted within an authoritarian regime?
Read the article: the poll surveyed Palestinians in southern Gaza and the West Bank.
While both are authoritarian, the West Bank, as you know, is ruled by the Palestinian Authority, a fierce rival of Hamas. Residents there will be under pressure *not* to support Hamas, so the poll results are even more striking.
To maintain statistical accuracy, about 60% of poll subjects would have been in the West Bank.
The poll mentioned below was carried out by an outfit from Birzeit University in Ramallah. The results used to be readily accessible through their website at:
https://www.awrad.org/en/article/10719/Wartime-Poll-Results-of-an-Opinion-Poll-Among-Palestinians-in-the-West-Bank-and-Gaza-Strip
I was able to access the results tables in English a couple of weeks ago and have a copy of them, but, interestingly, they no longer have them available in English in their webpage, only in Arabic. Instead they have a sort of breakdown analysis that essentially leaves unmentioned some of the most inconvenient results that are emphasized in the press articles referred to in the comments below.
From the results tables it becomes clear that, in a nutshell, only 7% of Gazans like Hamas's government, but 2/3 to 3/4 of them support Hamas's aims & strategies vis-a-vis Israel, including 70% support for a single Palestinian state "From the River to the Sea". Hence the question as to whether Hamas represents the Palestinians in Gaza is somewhat misleading.
Many of us would have wished the picture looked a bit more hopeful for a future peaceful compromise. But, let's face it, it's not the case.
Had Sherman only known of Scarlett O’Hara’s indifference to the Confederate cause, Atlanta needn’t have burned!
The level of popular support among Gazans for the genocidal aims of their rulers is a red herring, unknowable and irrelevant to Israel’s conduct of the war. Those not in the fight cannot be killed at random, but nor does their presence obligate Israel to pursue anything less than complete and durable elimination of Gaza’s will and capacity to threaten Israeli citizens.
As the real Sherman said, “we cannot change the hearts and minds of the South, but we can make war so terrible that generations would pass away before they would again appeal to it.”
I have no doubt that Gazans have been suppressed and used by Hamas for its grizzly war to terrorize Israelis. However Israel has to destroy Hamas and war is messy. Once Hamas is uprooted the world will see if there are any of these peace desiring Gazans who can become leaders of their people.
My Jewish friend in Israel said Hamas won the election in Gaza violently. This is about Hamas vs. Israel not Palestinians vs. Israel. My friend is a supporter of the Palestinians, has friends who are Palestinian and speaks Arabic and Hebrew. I've known him for 16 years, I believe what he tells me.
A free press demanding some version of free speech is vital. It is not even close to a human reality unfortunately. Thank you to The Free Press for trying. Gift subscriptions will be part of my contribution to the world.
The average Palestinian trying to live their life in Gaza is just another victim of Hamas. This attack had no potential upside for the normal people living in Gaza whatsoever, it was an antisemitic terror attack meant to provoke exactly the response it provoked. The Palestinians are pawns in all this.
The world does not seem to have a solution to combat religious fundamentalism in the middle east, though. The Palestinians need a legitimate government who watches out for their interests, but Hamas would never permit that.
Neither would Fatah. Or Hezbollah. Or the governments of Qatar, Iran, UAE, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Syria, Egypt, Iraq, Turkey...
All these whisperers are just that - whisperers. Until they take to streets like the brave people of Iran, they will remain irrelevant and unheard.
We know from recent surveys that 75%of Gazans strongly support
If the Gazans are so sick of Hamas, this seems like a good time to denounce them and point them out. I’m not seeing that. Maybe they don’t trust all those UN Do-Gooders to protect them. But this is their time. This is their chance for freedom. Yes Hamas will slaughter some of them, but a prolonged war will kill more. At least this way they will be True Palestinian Heroes. Gazans, do you want freedom and a better life? This.Is.Your.Chance.
Anti Hamas? I don’t think so. The people in Gaza were shown rejoicing and dancing in the streets on October 7th, when they first learned of the terrorist attack on Israel. They also beat the hostages when Hamas marched them through the streets of Gaza. The people of Gaza, like most people around the world, hate the Jews, and they support Hamas since Hamas stated purpose is to rid the land, once known as Judea, of Jews.
It’s obvious that the people who agreed to speak do not represent a majority opinion of the people living in Gaza. If they did, then the moderate Palestinians would rise up and overthrow Hamas’ leaders. The people in Gaza were shown rejoicing in the streets when they learned of the October 7th terrorist attack against Israeli citizens. There are also documented reports of hostages being beaten by Gazan citizens as they were dragged through the streets of Gaza.
Thanks so much for this.