In an October 6, 2024 article in the London-based Saudi daily Al-Sharq Al-Awsat, Saudi journalist and researcher Fahad Suleiman Shoqiran criticized the Hamas and Hizbullah terrorist organizations for appropriating the concept of "resistance." He wrote that resistance means self-defense or waging war against an attacker, but the so-called resistance movements have charged it with a fundamentalist ideology that promotes a culture of suicide – a culture that is not just manifest in sending suicide bombers to blow themselves up in cafes in Jerusalem or Tel Aviv, but in entrapping and endangering entire cities and societies. This culture, he added, maintained in the name of resistance or of Palestine, constitutes a crime against humanity, for which these organizations should stand trial.
Fahad Suleiman Shoqiran (Image:Okaz, Saudi Arabia)
The following are translated excerpts from Shoqiran's article:[1]
"It is only natural that the situation in the region is tense, especially after these large [Israeli] attacks, which are broadcast live, and following the assassination of the leader of the Hizbullah militia, along with others who were killed or will be killed in the future. Israel is carrying out powerful operations. Countries are not charitable associations; they have their own interests, objectives and operations, and on this basis a well-founded and well-considered strategy must be formulated…
"The effort of the resistance axis and its militias to put Israel to the test and plumb [the depths] of its fury every couple of years is regrettable. After the 2006 war, which caused the deaths of more than two thousand Lebanese, as well as severe economic damage in the amount of two billion dollars, Nasrallah made his famous statement: 'If I had known, I wouldn't have kidnapped the two Israeli soldiers.' In 2009 Hamas tested the Israelis again and caused huge massacres, and the same thing happened in 2012 and in 2014. Now [Hamas] is trying out a war with the Israelis while Lebanon is being pulverized…
"The problem today lies in the fact that the meaning of 'resistance' has expanded since the establishment of Hizbullah, the Palestinian brigades and the Hamas movement, [and this expansion] did not end [even] with the Houthis. The concept of resistance has been loaded and charged with fundamentalist ideology and does not mean self-defense or war waged against an attacker [anymore]. It has its own religious, ideological and political partisan context.
"The concept of resistance has become associated with escalating suicide attacks and with pressuring the enemy not through military action but rather through a culture of suicide. I am not referring here only to the jihad fighter from [Hamas' military wing], the 'Izz Ad-Din Al-Qassam Brigades, who blows himself up in a café in Jerusalem or Tel Aviv. Hamas has trapped the entire Palestinian people and Gaza inside the explosive belt of its recklessness, leaving them at the mercy of [its] irresponsible decision to test the response of the Israelis, who are known for their violence and destructiveness. As we know, the Israeli force is merciless, and the Arabs have become accustomed to it over their history, which is rife with defeats and nakbas. The Lebanese, Syrian, Palestinian and Yemeni people have lost enormous sums, economies have crashed and peoples have lost their stability and are at a loss [what to do] under the rule of foolish and reckless regimes.
"For decades, the Palestinian cause has served the [Arab] statesmen as a moral snare, [used to] justify their crimes to the peoples. Countries and capital cities have been pulverized, entire states have been occupied and millions have been expelled [from their homes] in the name of resistance and in the name of Palestine. If the nations are determined to evolve, they must establish courts where the leaders of the resistance will be brought to justice. When a culture of suicide develops—ranging from the entrapment of an individual to the entrapment of entire capitals and societies—it constitutes a crime against humanity. That is why there is widespread sympathy for [these] heavy disasters, whose victims have been taken hostage by dark forces subordinate to states that have abandoned true Islam.
"Ultimately, history always draws its conclusions, and we must take note of the fact that this period is the most difficult of all and that failing to return to the roots, to the law and to [state] institutions will jeopardize global security, for times have changed… Some of the norms and moral [principles] that are part of the discourse about Palestine were formulated by the Muslim Brotherhood [MB], and a group of intellectuals and academics now parrot them. Today the [resistance] axis is trying to revive the MB discourse with all its might and to establish the MB lexicon on Palestine as the permanent [lexicon used] in political commentary and in media coverage of the war Israel is waging. This is an act of injustice and of ignoring the development that has occurred among some of the Arab peoples, especially those that have opted for peace and sighed agreements of tolerance and reconciliation among the [Abrahamic] religions. This attack and escapade of Hamas' was just meant to delay any peace agreement that was supposed to be [signed]…"
[1] Al-Sharq Al-Awsat (London), October 6, 2024.
