The Hamas Movement has always enjoyed widespread popular admiration and respect at home and abroad and been seen as the giant of the Palestinian resistance but The Jerusalem Post website said recently that this popularity of Hamas “seems to have increased during and after last May’s 11-day war with Israel.”
“If there’s one thing that many Israelis and Palestinians agree on it’s that Hamas enjoys widespread support among the Arab residents of Jerusalem” journalist Khaled Abu Toameh who works for The Jerusalem Post wrote in an article published on the website.
“The war which erupted amid the controversy surrounding the eviction of Arab families from their homes in Sheikh Jarrah and Israeli security measures in the city specifically al-Aqsa Mosque compound allowed Hamas to present itself as the ‘defender’ of Jerusalem and its residents and holy sites” Abu Toameh explained.
“Hamas is perceived as having initiated the war to stop the Sheikh Jarrah evictions and force Israel to rescind its strict security measures in Jerusalem’s Old City and on the Aqsa Mosque compound.”
“During and after the war thousands of Muslim worshipers demonstrated following Friday prayers at the Aqsa Mosque compound chanting slogans in support of Hamas and its “military” wing Izaddin al-Qassam” he pointed out.
Most of those demonstrators the writer said were residents of east Jerusalem and called on Hamas to continue to launch rockets at Israel and pursue the armed struggle until the liberation of Jerusalem and all Palestine.
Such growing popularity of the Movement in Jerusalem has encouraged Hamas leaders to open direct channels of communication with many east Jerusalem residents to the dismay of the Palestinian Authority according to the writer.
“Hamas leader Ismail Haneyya has been in direct contact with the Sheikh Jarrah families threatened with eviction. He has also phoned a number of east Jerusalem residents including a woman protesting Israeli [destruction] work near her son’s grave by the Lions Gate” he said.
“Like many Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip the predominantly Muslim residents of east Jerusalem are part of a conservative and religious society that supports any group that is associated with Islam. The PA by contrast is loathed by many Palestinians because it is regarded as a corrupt secular regime that operates in violation of Islamic teachings” he underscored.
“The dispute surrounding the Sheikh Jarrah families and continued visits by Jews to [the Aqsa Mosque] have been at the center of a well-organized Palestinian campaign that has accused Israel of carrying out “ethnic cleansing” and conspiring against Islamic (and Christian) holy sites in Jerusalem” he claimed.
