As the Washington Post and other sources report, the U.S. has charged six Hamas officials with criminal counts of terrorism connected with the October 7 attack on Israel:
U.S. officials unsealed charges Tuesday against senior Hamas leaders, accusing them of conspiring to provide material support to a terrorist organization, conspiring to murder Americans and conspiring to use weapons of mass destruction.
The criminal complaint against Hamas leader Yehiya Sinwar and others was made public as U.S. diplomats are preparing to present Israel and Hamas with a final hostage-release and cease-fire proposal, potentially as soon as this week.
Bizarrely, at least three of these officials are dead. Another, Yahya Sinwar, the military head of Hamas, is scuttling around the tunnels of Gaza and is, at present, beyond reach. But at least one person, the political head of Hamas, and who lives in Doha, Qatar, is within the reach of U.S. courts. Here’s the list of those indicted, taken from the Times of Israel.Notes are mine except for those in quotes.
Yahya Sinwar, the military head of Hamas. Scuttling around the tunnels under Gaza. Sinwar served 22 years in an Israeli prison for terrorism until he was released in a prisoner swap and went on to plan the October 7 massacre (remember that when you start approving of such swaps to get the hostages back). One of the ironic things about Sinwar is that Israeli doctors saved his life by removing a malignant brain tumor when he was in prison, and he not only didn’t give up his hatred of Israel and Jews, but the nephew of the main doctor who saved him was killed in the October 7 massacre.
Ismail Haniyeh, former political head of Hamas who lived in Qatar but was assassinated (almost surely by Israel) by a bomb planted in his room during a visit to Tehran last July.
Marwan Issa, “the once-deputy leader of Hamas’s armed wing in Gaza, who was killed by Israel in March.”
Khaled Mashaal, “a Haniyeh deputy based in Doha and a former [political] leader of the group.” Now that Haniyeh is dead, Sinwar has taken over political and military control of Hamas, but Mashaal is playing a very important role in the group, not to mention all the money that Hamas has in the hands of its members in Qatar. Mashaal recently called for a return of Palestinians to conducting suicide attacks on Israelis.
Muhammad Deif, the longtime Hamas military wing chief, who Israel killed in July. Wikipedia says it’s not sure he’s dead, though was crippled after several assassination attempts, but the IDF says it’s sure he’s dead, and on matters like this I trust the IDF more than Wikipedia.
Ali Baraka, “the Beirut-based head of Hamas’s external relations.”
Now I don’t know what the point of indicting three dead people is; if anything, it’s a purely symbolic gesture. The most likely explanation is that the indictment was issued in February and was just unsealed, and the three dead thugs were still alive in February.
But anybody indicted who is still alive and resides in Qatar can be subject to extradition, and that means Mashaal. The U.S. should ask for his extradition immediately, though given who’s in charge of America now, I doubt this will happen.
Which brings us to the Gaza “peace plan”. The U.S. is saying that it’s about to float a “take-it-or-leave-it” peace deal for Gaza, and although the details are hazy, it seems to involve a time-limited ceasefire in hopes of a permanent one, a swap of some of the living and dead hostages (not all at once) for a pile of live Palestinians imprisoned in Israel, and nothing about the surrender of Hamas.
This is a plan that will fail, and it’s also short-sighted. It will leave Hamas in power and will not end anti-Israel terrorism. If you want a good explication of its problems, read Bret Stephens’s column in the NYT yesterday, “A hostage deal is a poison pill for Israel” (link is archived).
Like me, Stephens is no fan of Netanyahu, but he thinks that the PM is right in his strategy about the war (read the column). Stephens has always been the most sensible NYT op-ed writer about the war: far more cogent than, for example, Tom “I Know Nothing” Friedman. Stephens’s column, which once again I recommend, ends this way:
There are bright people who say that what Israel ought to do now is cut a deal, recover its hostages, take a breather and start preparing for the next war, probably in Lebanon. Israelis should remember that wars will be worse, and come more often, to those who fail to win them.
Here’s my own recommendations for ending the war. They may not work, but they seem sensible, and most of them are based on Malgorzata’s ideas:
a.) Call for the extradition of Mashaal now.
b.) Qatar should arrest all Hamas members finding refuge in that country and freeze their bank accounts (there are billions of dollars there, most of the money in the hands of Hamas). That money should be used to rebuild Gaza.
c.) The first two points should be done under a U.S. threat: do these things or face the removal of the U.S. military presence in Qatar (its base is shared with the RAF, so the UK would have to agree as well). We don’t need the base that badly (we have other bases in other Middle East nations), but Qatar desperately needs it, for without it, oil-rich Qatar will be taken over by countries like the UAE, Kuwait, and Saudi Arabia.(Qatar has almost no military of its own.) This would be a threat with real teeth. And the U.S. should be ready to follow through with it, as with all meaningful threats.
d.) Instead of confecting unworkable and, frankly, stupid peace plans, the U.S. should simply call for the unconditional surrender of Hamas and the instantaneous release of all the hostages. Hamas will not surrender, of course, but anybody who values their life (and yes, there’s a rub there) must realize that Israel under Netanyahu has vowed to destroy the military capabilities of Hamas—and will do so. The Biden Administration (and Harris, should she win) should be giving nothing to terrorists like Hamas.
The moral right in this conflict lies with Israel, not with Hamas, and the U.S. should be calling for the terrorists to give up, end the war, and release the hostages. Remember again that the “take-it-or-leave-it” deal will not work and gives plenty of stuff to Hamas.
Needless to say, the U.S. should not be cutting aid to Israel, even though some European countries are. Such cuts are again ludicrous and short-sighted given Israel’s care to kill as few Gazan civilians as possible combined with Hamas’s desire to get as many non-combatant Gazan civilians killed as possible to excite the world’s opprobrium against Israel. Right now, Europe, and to some extent the U.S., is doing pretty much what Hamas wants.
e.) What about the day after? A two-state solution is not in the offing right now; that much is clear and amounts to rewarding Hamas for the October 7 attack. I suspect that a military occupation of Gaza will have to occur for some time, as happened in Germany and Japan after World War II. At the same time, Israel and its allies should be grooming reasonable and peaceful Palestinians to take over running Gaza. (I’m not discussing the West Bank here.)
Yes, yes, I know all the weaknesses of this plan: Hamas won’t give up, the U.S. won’t threaten to dismantle a military base, no credible Palestinians who don’t want to destroy Israel will be found, etc. etc. If you want to pick at the plan, at least do something constructive and propose a better one, and one that doesn’t lead to Israel losing the war and facing many more October-7-like episodes.
But one thing is certain, something Bret Stephens encapsulates in his last sentence: all the “cease fire” proposals floating around now are guaranteed to leave Hamas in power, and thus to keep a constant threat of terrorism against Israel. And that means that peace will never be attained.
Professor Jerry Coyne is an American biologist known for his work on speciation and his commentary on intelligent design, a prolific scientist and author. This article was first published HERE
4 comments:
Bravo Jerry. That's what I call a realistic assessment of the Gaza affair and a well-considered set of conclusions.
What a shame that Professor Coyne neglects to disclose the clear interest he has on account of the very salient fact of his being Jewish (notoriously one-eyed and willing to throw out all objectivity when it promotes the group cause), which obviously leads to him making such ludicrously ingroup- biased statements such as:
"The moral right in this conflict lies with Israel, not with Hamas, and the U.S. should be calling for the terrorists to give up, end the war, and release the hostages. Remember again that the “take-it-or-leave-it” deal will not work and gives plenty of stuff to Hamas.
Needless to say, the U.S. should not be cutting aid to Israel, even though some European countries are. Such cuts are again ludicrous and short-sighted given Israel’s care to kill as few Gazan civilians as possible combined with Hamas’s desire to get as many non-combatant Gazan civilians killed as possible to excite the world’s opprobrium against Israel."
In short, blame everyone else for the situations Jews find themselves in, and the flipside of this, which is never blame Jews for the plight of any other (oh, and don't forget to keep giving generously!).
The good professor also quotes his Jewish co-ethnic Bret Stephens in support of his argument as if Bret Stephens too had no axe to grind.
Naturally, he can make any case he likes, but doing what he and so many others like him do (that is, painting what are extremely subjective and self-interested situations and positions as being self-evidently beyond debate and objective and something we should all get behind, to readers who often don't know the all important perspectival context), is probably one of the reasons so many gullible people read this kind of garbage and fall in behind Israel.
Or Israel removes it's forces and closes it's border with Gaza forever. Nothing either way. Pass the problem to those who are crying about how unjust it is to try and protect your people.
This would have also been the best initial response. Hamas wants as many civilians as possible killed. So just shut them out, like you would do to any neighbour that acts badly.
I H Calirly finds its odd that a Jew would have the nerve to be one-sided when it comes to dealing with HAMAS. Perhaps he also feels it is necessary to have a polite debate about the pros and cons of the holocaust. So why shouldn't a Jew espouse the Jewish cause when HAMAS is telling the world their objective is to wipe Israel off the map. Given their history, Jews can are probably entitled to be a "one-eyed"over defending their land. They don't have anywhere else to go.
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