As Israelis mourned the dead and struggled to come to terms with the darkest day in the Jewish state’s history, Arab social media was awash with their differing opinions on Hamas’ deadly attack: “Prison Break.”
Across different platforms, posts showed images ranging from the breached Israeli security barrier surrounding Gaza, the Palestinian territory from which Hamas launched dawn attacks on southern Israel, to Palestinian flags breaking free from Israeli yoke Color clenched fist.
The viral posts reflect how many people across the Arab world are ambivalent about or openly supportive of Hamas’ brutal attacks and have seized the moment to express their solidarity with the Palestinian cause.
Many who posted on social media chose to ignore images of atrocities committed by Hamas militants, who killed more than 1,200 people, including women and children, and kidnapped dozens more, according to Israeli officials . Voices condemning armed factions’ targeting of civilians are often silenced.
Arab officials and analysts said the reaction was expected after 75 years of watching Israel engage in conflicts with Palestinians, discriminate against them and occupy their land while building an army to defeat Arab armies.
“I’m not surprised, I’m frustrated because what Hamas is doing is absolutely barbaric and unjustified, but the Arabs just see what they want to see,” said one Arab analyst. “They have suffered so much loss, pain and humiliation that they underestimate what the other side is facing.”
Adding to the schadenfreude was the knowledge that the attack was carried out by a Palestinian faction that was able to breach the security barrier in the impoverished Gaza Strip and deal a heavy blow to the Middle East’s most powerful security forces. Arabs and human rights activists have long described Gaza as an “open-air prison”.
But the ultimate reaction reflects how decades of conflict have taught many Arabs and Israelis to dehumanize one another. The animosity dates back to the birth of the Jewish state in 1948 – what Palestinians call the Nakba, or catastrophe, which displaced hundreds of thousands of people.
The analyst said some in the Arab world are “looking for ways to justify their darkest feelings,” whether ideologically believing that all Israelis are “settlers” in Arab lands or choosing not to believe so. Accepting “an irrelevant narrative” that Hamas committed atrocities against civilians.
Arab governments have also issued statements of support for the Palestinians. They condemned the violence but pointed to Israel’s treatment of Palestinians as the root cause of Hamas’ attacks, undermining U.S. and Israeli efforts to strengthen ties between the Jewish state and Arab countries.
“This conflict exposes the myth that Israel does not need to make peace with the Palestinians; they can make peace with the rest of the Arab world,” said Marwan Muasher, Jordan’s former foreign minister. “That’s a myth and this has proven it.”
Diplomats say the Arab sentiment is not about support for Hamas – which many Arab countries and peoples dismiss as an extremist faction aligned with Iran – but about solidarity with the Palestinians, especially those who have been imprisoned in Gaza. Blockade of Palestinians.
“This is a precedent that inspires many people in the region because the situation in the Palestinian territories is simply untenable and no one is paying attention,” one Arab official said.
He cited recent attacks against Palestinians around Jerusalem’s Al-Aqsa Mosque and said: “These are things that will not go unnoticed in the Arab world.”
Hamas has long billed itself as a defender of Al-Aqsa Mosque, Islam’s third holiest site in the compound known to Palestinians as Haram al-Sharif. The building, known to Jews as the Temple Mount and Judaism’s holiest site, is an ongoing flashpoint in the long-running Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Arab diplomats and analysts say Arab hostility toward Israel has intensified since Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu formed the Jewish state’s most extreme, far-right government late last year. Ahead of the formation of a national unity government on Wednesday, his coalition includes religious Zionist settlers who have spoken openly about annexing the occupied West Bank and have a history of demonizing Palestinians.
The influx of 2.3 million Palestinians into Gaza, with Israel and Egypt controlling entry points along the coastal strip, has heightened such sentiments. Gaza health officials say Israeli bombardment of the enclave has killed more than 1,200 people since Saturday.
Almost daily Israeli attacks in the West Bank over the past 18 months, coupled with the slow annexation of the territory, have also fueled Palestinian anger.
“You have a radical and racist Israeli government, a Palestinian Authority (in the West Bank) that has little credibility among its people, and an international community that has largely ignored the Palestinian issue, especially the Palestinian issue,” Muasher said. It’s America.” “So we’ve been waiting for this. . . . Do you want people to be locked up in cages forever?”
Jordan and Egypt, which border Israel, have long warned of the risks of ignoring the Palestinian issue, while successive U.S. administrations have pushed for Arab states to normalize relations with Israel. Until recently, Egypt and Jordan were the only two Arab countries to have full diplomatic relations with the Jewish state. Both countries have a history of conflict with Israel and have experienced cold peace.
But in 2020, former US President Trump brokered deals that led to the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Sudan and Morocco establishing diplomatic relations with Israel.
They are all countries that have no borders with Israel and are not involved in the Arab war against the Jewish state. Palestinian leaders accuse the group of betraying their cause because Israel has not made any meaningful concessions to the Palestinians.
Recently, President Joe Biden has been pursuing a deal that would allow Saudi Arabia to establish diplomatic relations with Israel. But Hamas’ attacks may have derailed those plans, just when they appeared to be inching towards a deal.
Saudi Arabia, which does not support Hamas, issued a statement saying it warned before the war about Israeli “provocations”. Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman later spoke to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and reiterated his support for the Palestinians.
Emil Hokayem, director of regional security at the International Institute for Strategic Studies in London, said Hamas has shown it can reshape regional dynamics.
“This war will be transformative, it will force Israel to have a very different view of the region. It will shift the discussion away from the dominant topics – normalization, trade, infrastructure and cooperation,” Hokaye said. Mu added.
“We should not expect Arab countries to show the same enthusiasm (for Israel); the dialogue is mainly about security, not integration and trade.”
For some in the Arab world, there is also concern that the conflict will spread across national borders. In Lebanon, a country racked by an economic crisis and political paralysis, fears that the Iran-backed militant movement Hezbollah will become involved in the war have prompted Israel to respond to the country with military force.
In Egypt and Jordan, there is unease over the possibility of Israel trying to push the Palestinian issue beyond those countries’ borders: both countries have warned Israel that Palestinian frustration could boil over in an attack. Others worry that the West’s response to Hamas’ atrocities has given Israel a green light to use unlimited force against Gaza.
“This brings the Palestinian issue back into the spotlight,” said one Arab diplomat. “But Western countries are willing to give (Israel) carte blanche to retaliate as it wants, and that has caused some reactions.”
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