Hamas calls US president “mentally ill” after the US State Department put Ismail Haniyeh on its global terror list.
By: Margot Dudkevitch, World Israel News
A decision by the United States to place Hamas political chief Ismail Haniyeh on its global terror list is a dangerous development, Hamas warned. In a statement released Wednesday following the US decision, Hamas called the decision a “violation of international law, which has given the Palestinian people a right to defend themselves against [Israeli] occupation and to choose their leaders.”
The decision “demonstrates the full American bias in favor of the Israeli occupation and provides an official cover for Israeli crimes against the Palestinian people,” the statement, published by Aljazeera, said.
The Palestinian Authority, who in a bid for unity unsuccessfully has sought to reconcile with Hamas a number of times, failed to respond to the US State Department’s decision that effectively bars Haniyeh from visiting the United States, holding assets there or doing any business with Americans. For decades the US has deemed Hamas a terror organization.
In its press release, the US State Department said Haniyeh has close links with the Hamas military wing Izzadin al-Qassam and “has been a proponent of armed struggle including against civilians.”
Haniyeh “has been involved in Hamas’ campaign of terrorism against Israel for years and even decades,” Breitbart quoted Nathan A. Sales, the State Department’s Coordinator for Counterterrorism, as saying. Hamas, he said, is a “terrorist organization committed to the destruction of the State of Israel.”
Calling Haniyeh an “icon of Palestinian resistance,” Ghazi Hamad, a Hamas official in the Gaza Strip, deemed the US’ decision part of a wide campaign against the Palestinians since US President Donald Trump took office. Calling the American president “mentally ill,” Hamad said “the US Administration has been trying to impose its misguided policies on the Middle East,” reported Haaretz.