On October 7, the world as we know it changed. In the early hours of the morning, hundreds of armed Hamas operatives broke into Israel, launching a surprise attack on the IDF headquarters in the South of Israel in order to neutralize resistance for several hours. They set out to perform premeditated and meticulously planned crimes against humanity, sent by Iran.
The terrorists proceeded to massacre innocent and unarmed civilians, inhabitants of the Israeli villages bordering the Gaza Strip. Mothers were raped in front of the gaping eyes of their children. Babies and infants were tied together and shot in front of their parents. People were burnt alive. Young women were gang raped until their limbs were dismembered. Babies were beheaded.
Simultaneously, other Hamas operatives raided a peace festival in which hundreds were executed, gang raped, and burned. All these atrocities were documented by the perpetrators themselves and proudly posted on social media.
The meticulously laid plans were found, in Arabic, on the bodies of those operatives who were later killed and/or captured by the Israel Defense Forces. This was the beginning of a war that has little to do with Israel. It has everything to do with humanity.
People call on the release of Israelis held hostage by Hamas militants in Gaza, outside the Ministry of Defense in Tel Aviv, October 18, 2023. (credit: Chaim Goldberg/Flash90)
Iran is using the hate against the Jewish state
The Iranian plan to dominate the region and spread its hegemony has begun with Israel because of their knowledge that it is easy to galvanize hatred, incitement, and fury towards Israel and the Jewish people. Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) and Hezbollah are pawns in the grand plan which calls for the involvement of Jihadists throughout the world to join the religious extremist Islamic battle against the “disbelievers” – that is everyone who is not of their kind. As I write these very words, similar hate crimes are conducted in several European capitals in the name of this so-called “holy war.”
Hamas, funded and trained by the mullah regime in Iran, was encouraged to set forth and begin its unholy crusade in the South of Israel while its members laid out, loudly and clearly, in Arabic, that the next step in their plan was to galvanize support amid Palestinians in the West Bank.
IN THAT arena, the Iranian backing of Hamas and PIJ has been long and systematic, working its way amidst the disillusioned population, vastly disappointed and disenchanted with its corrupt Palestinian secular Fatah leadership.
The Israeli government’s longtime weakening of Palestinian rule in the West Bank, while allowing Qatar to stream in funding to the Hamas in return for quiet on Israel’s Southern border, has also backfired. The current Palestinian Authority – far from being an innocent bed of roses itself – is currently trying to quench the growing fury of its own Palestinian inhabitants as they are encouraged by Hamas and Iran to take up arms and join the fight against Israel and the Jews. The Palestinian Fatah leadership in the West Bank, headed by President Mahmoud Abbas, know that the Hamas will not allow them to continue their rule over the Palestinian people.
They most certainly understand what Hamas is — and what a threat it poses to them, recalling that their own officers were lynched and thrown off rooftops by Hamas and its people, when the they took over the Gaza Strip in 2005. The next step in the Iranian roadmap is the Northern front, where Hamas is also present, and Hezbollah has become the long arm of Iran. Slowly, but surely, Hezbollah had taken power over Lebanon, disintegrating the beautiful Swiss-like country into a ruined, destitute, and failed state, while arming themselves with approximately 150,000 precision artillery provided for and funded by Iran. Syria, too, has long ago been turned into an Iranian backyard in which despite the Israeli bombardment of constant shipments of weapons from Iran, significant strength and capabilities have been concentrated in it for the opportune moment to attack Israel.
A war against the Jewish people
Meanwhile, Iran is calling Iraqi Shi’ites to join in the “holy” war against Israel on the Northern front, while Hezbollah is attempting infiltration after infiltration into Israeli territory and shooting rockets at Israeli cities and towns in the North.
The idea is that a Jihad will be launched, worldwide, first against Jewish institutions and Jews, and then against all those who are not Muslim, including those who are not the “right” kind of Muslims, similarly to what ISIS did to Muslims in Iraq, Syria, and elsewhere. Indeed, this is a clash of civilizations of completely different proportions than an Israel-Hamas war. The very understanding of the magnitude of these events is perhaps the first step towards beginning to create the international coalition and the solutions needed to quell it.
The next step is preventing the dissemination of this pure hatred and incitement, which is deeply entrenched in school books funded by European, Canadian and American tax payers’ hard-earned cash. Once these caviats are realized, then perhaps the international community can begin to create a new world order in which a much-needed coalition will be established for the purposes of ridding itself of extremist terrorist regimes such as Hamas and creating a real opportunity for growth for the region.
The writer is a former MK from the Blue and White party, a former adviser to president Shimon Peres, and past deputy ambassador in Cairo.