Minutes from a high-level Hamas meeting obtained by the Washington Journal reveal that late Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar told his fellow henchmen that an “extraordinary act” was necessary to prevent Saudi Arabia normalization with Israel.
“There is no doubt that the Saudi-Zionist normalization agreement is progressing significantly,” Sinwar warned on Oct. 2, 2023, just five days before his forces launched its devastating attack against Israel that killed 1,200 innocents and led to 251 hostages taken to Gaza,
Warning that that such a deal would “open the door for the majority of Arab and Islamic countries to follow the same path,” Sinwar was determined to launch the attack that he had been in for two years in order to “bring about a major move or a strategic shift in the paths and balances of the region with regard to the Palestinian cause.”
Previously, the Journal reported that a separate meeting took place in Beirut on the same day as the Gaza gathering, involving representatives of Hamas and Iranian security officials. According to senior members of Hamas and Hezbollah cited in that report, Iran approved the Oct. 7 invasion, though other officials from both terror groups have disputed this account.
Among other internal documents recovered by the IDF was a September memo recommending escalation of conflict in Judea and Samaria and East Jerusalem to complicate Saudi-Israeli normalization efforts, with Hamas expressing skepticism about Saudi pledges to uphold Arab interests, calling them “weak and limited.”
An internal briefing marked “secret” from August 2022, written by Hamas’s leadership, concluded: “It has become the duty of the movement to reposition itself to… preserve the survival of the Palestinian cause in the face of the broad wave of normalization by Arab countries, which aims primarily to liquidate the Palestinian cause.”
Hamas’s gamble appears to have succeeded, with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman holding firm since Oct. 7 that normalization cannot proceed unless Israel halts the war in Gaza and agrees to a diplomatic process that would eventually lead to a Palestinian state.
Source link
