by Bassam Tawil • May 26, 2025
25th anniversary of Hamas celebrated in Gaza. (Photo by Fars Media Corporation, CC BY 4.0)
- After the 2007 Hamas takeover, the Gaza Strip became an independent Palestinian state controlled by Hamas, with its own government, parliament, police force, and multiple armed groups. The Hamas rulers of the Gaza Strip, in addition, had exclusive control over the border with Egypt, which was also abandoned by Israel.
- In the absence of any Israeli military or civilian presence inside Gaza, Hamas had a chance to turn the coastal strip into a prosperous area, a “Singapore” or “Dubai” on the Mediterranean. Instead, the terror group chose to manufacture and smuggle weapons, including rockets and missiles, and invest tens of millions of dollars in building a vast network of tunnels for stockpiling its weapons, facilitating the concealed movement of terrorists, and providing shelter for its leaders and members.
- [T]he war is continuing because of Hamas’s refusal to release the remaining Israeli hostages, relinquish control over the Gaza Strip and lay down its weapons. Hamas, backed and armed by Iran, is determined to fight to the last Palestinian because its primary goal is to destroy Israel and replace it with an Islamist state.
- For more than a decade, these payments [to the Palestinian “pay-for-slay” program] have amounted to more than $300 million annually. Last year, the PA’s payments increased by $1.3 million per month. The murder of Jews is what the European Union and many European countries have been funding.
- By advocating a “two-state solution,” France, Canada and Britain are essentially authorizing a genocide.
- Before reviving their idea, the French, Canadians and British need to look at the results of all of the polls. They consistently show that most Palestinians support Hamas and the armed struggle against Israel. The last thing Palestinians and Israelis need now is to transplant the failed Gaza model onto the West Bank.
As the Hamas-Israel war in the Gaza Strip enters its 20th month, France, Britain and Canada have revived the talk about the need to establish a Palestinian state. In a joint statement in mid-May, the leaders of the three countries proclaimed:
“We are committed to recognizing a Palestinian state as a contribution to achieving a two-state solution and are prepared to work with others to this end.”
Next month, the United Nations is scheduled to host an international conference, co-chaired by France and Saudi Arabia, to advance the idea of a “two-state solution” between Israel and the Palestinians.
According to the UN:
“As outlined in General Assembly resolution 79/81, the Conference will produce an action-oriented outcome document entitled ‘Peaceful settlement of the question of Palestine and implementation of the two-State solution.'”
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