Hamas: Iranian-backed, mullah approved
posted at 12:00 pm on March 9, 2008 by Ed Morrissey
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A Hamas commander confirmed to the Times of London what most people assumed: Iran has made Hamas its proxy against Israel. Since the Hamas coup in Gaza in 2006, Iran has provided funding and training to Hamas. The Revolutionary Guard has trained over 150 Hamas fighters, further implicating the Iranian military directly in terrorism:
Last week Yuval Diskin, the head of the Israeli internal security service Shin Bet, said as much when he claimed that Hamas had “started to dispatch people to Iran, tens and a promise of hundreds”. He provided no evidence.
The Hamas commander, however, confirmed for the first time that the Iranian Revolutionary Guard has been training its men in Tehran for more than two years and is currently honing the skills of 150 fighters.
The details he gave suggested that, if anything, Shin Bet has underestimated the extent of Iran’s influence on Hamas’s increasingly sophisticated tactics and weaponry.
Speaking on the record but withholding his identity as a target of Israeli forces, the commander, who has a sparse moustache and oiled black hair, said Hamas had been sending fighters to Iran for training in both field tactics and weapons technology since Israeli troops pulled out of the Gaza strip of Palestinian territory in 2005. Others go to Syria for more basic training.
It sounds like a corporate training program. Hamas sends its Qassam militia members to Tehran, who receive basic instruction. The most promising remain in Tehran for more extensive training, and then return to Gaza as trainers themselves. Others go into “research” if deemed not tough enough for actual fighting. Syria, meanwhile, continues to provide more basic training for Hamas terrorists.
This gives Iran a devastating one-two punch against Israel. They already control Hezbollah in Lebanon in a similar relationship between themselves and the Syrians. With Hamas in Gaza, the Iranians can impose a two-front war on Israel by proxy. That could already be seen during the last war in Lebanon, when Hamas kidnapped Gilad Shalit and shifted the focus from the sub-Litani region to Gaza — and Shalit has not yet been returned.
Not long ago, the Bush administration tried to declare the Revolutionary Guard a terrorist organization. That met with a serious amount of resistance, some of it well-founded. After all, if the legitimate military of a state engages in terrorism, it isn’t the military that’s the problem. This underscores that problem. The Revolutionary Guard may provide the training, but that decision comes from the highest levels of the Iranian government — and they have to be held responsible for their sponsorship of terrorism, and not just their military.
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Captain, check your computer clocks.
Zorro on March 9, 2008 at 12:03 PM
Don’t suppose that’ll cause any liberal or anyone to really change their mind and look at Iran more suspiciously
Defector01 on March 9, 2008 at 12:08 PM
I think you’re right. Lines have been drawn; you’re either on the good side, or the bad. Everyone who supports the terrorists/Iran/islamofascists will be willing to look the other way.
emailnuevo on March 9, 2008 at 12:11 PM
Most of Us have known this for a great while.
http://www.swamppolitics.com/news/politics/blog/2008/03/gops_king_obama_win_would_caus.html#more
old trooper on March 9, 2008 at 12:14 PM
Contrary to the lefts’ complaints that Isreal disproportionately responds to Palestinian provocations, this report gives further evidence to the real threat Isreal is under.
Isreal should just do to Gaza what Iran wishes it could do to Isreal–drive them into the sea. If a country faces an existential threat, and the populace is strongly in favor of wiping your country off the face of the planet, then It would seem the population is a fair target. It was good enough for the Allies during WWII to bomb populations in Germany and Japan.
I know this runs contrary to modern “ethics of war”, if such a thing could possibly exist. But a resounding defeat for the Islamic extremists could set Iran and the jihadists back significantly.
BryanS on March 9, 2008 at 12:18 PM
That’s okay, we just need to sit down face-to-face with Ahmandinejad and we can work out these misunderstandings between us.
Iran wants to dominate the Gulf, drive the US out of the area, and be the predominate Islamic power in the region.
We’ll just have to talk them out of these goals.
Oy.
SteveMG on March 9, 2008 at 12:44 PM
emailnuevo on March 9, 2008 at 12:11 PM
You are correct. If Tel Aviv were to disappear beneath a mushroom cloud those on “that” side of the line will claim Israel deserved it. When an American city suffers the same fate these proponents of change will rationalize the murder of thousands by saying Bush’s policies created the situation. Those on “that” side of the line continue to blindly ignore history and hope that disingenuous rhetoric is enough to change America. If “that” side of the line is successful, I hope it will be a change we can survive.
dmann on March 9, 2008 at 12:53 PM
Before I leave for work, here’s a link to Pat Condell’s latest spiel “Appeasing Islam” in which he excoriates Europeans for their willful blindness and appeasement towards the “carpet chewing muppets” in their midst.
“….so it’s time to speak up Europe. It’s time to stop whining an bellyaching about the Americans for five minutes and show a little backbone for once… just once! Or, do we want to spend the rest of our lives, cowering like frightened mice from a handful of violent bigots who think they have a right to poke a finger into ~out~ chest and tell ~us~ how we’re allowed to live; what we can and can’t do, say, and think?”
FierceGuppy on March 9, 2008 at 12:53 PM
Doesn’t the Quds Force report directly to the Ayatollah. Maybe that’s why “smiley-time” Ahmadinejad is always denying this sort of nefarious involvement. He has no clue what the hell’s going on.
LT Nixon on March 9, 2008 at 1:00 PM
OY, Iranians will be dancing on the street when Obama wins the Election. true that.
gr8inferno on March 9, 2008 at 1:00 PM
Oh no, SteveMG, we just have to accede to their goals. That will increase America’s reputation in the world, just as a President Obamassiah wants.
rbj on March 9, 2008 at 1:03 PM
Seems like there’s dancing in the streets in the middle east for any setup of an enemy, nomatter how grave. The culture of the middle east is despicable when they can celebrate death and destruction such as 911 or the recent shootup/massacre in Isreal. Western populations understandably celebrate when victorious over our enemies, but when was the last time we saw in the west populations celebrating atrocities and disasters visited on our enemies?
I’m not a practicing Christian, but I firmly believe the Christian foundations of western culture still makes the US the example everyone else looks too. Time and again, we have practiced the idea of loving your enemy. In fact, one could say that it’s far better for a country to lose to the US (Japan, Germany, South Korea, Philippines, and hopefully Iraq and Afghanistan) than it is to win (North Korea, Vietnam).
Is there any doubt about the kind of world we’d live in if Iran and their Al Queda allies of convenience win?
BryanS on March 9, 2008 at 1:22 PM
The Isrealis should wait until Iran has one of those colorful hey we’re tough type parades and then blammo.
THE CHOSEN ONE on March 9, 2008 at 1:27 PM
Heh. It would be nice to see one of those displays go horrible wrong–might make the next tin pot dictator think twice about intimidating their populations through patriotic parades.
BryanS on March 9, 2008 at 1:35 PM
The reasons for ‘regime change’ in Iran multiply like rabbits: though it was not exactly a surprise that Iran is behind Hamas, I suppose the news is that Hamas terrorists are going to Iran for training.
With three carrier groups in the Persian Gulf, I rather thought that President Bush had plans to take out Iran’s nuclear facilities, which would of course require destroying their military infrastructure as well. But he seems to have been sandbagged by the ‘intelligence’ people.
Sooner or later we or the Israelis, or both, will have to take on Iran. I figured there would be an incident to provide an excuse. But you can expect the Iranians to bide their time, now, hoping for a Democrat like Obambi, who will give them free rein over the entire Middle East, as we pull out of Iraq.
Will we now wait until Iran smuggles atom bombs into Israel, or lobs them on missiles? The Israelis cannot afford to wait, but I doubt they can take on Iran without our help. There are only 6 million of them.
MrLynn on March 9, 2008 at 2:19 PM
Once the SOH is shut down, Obama will change his tune….riiiight.
Squid Shark on March 9, 2008 at 2:49 PM
I’m still itching for payback to Iran for the overrunning of our Embassy and the hostages… Payback’s a beeyotch!
Big John on March 9, 2008 at 3:04 PM
Well said, Bryan. However, the modern ethics of war you describe only applies to the west and civilized countries. In fact, the left’s version is to take it up *^&%^! and then to discuss it further. The jihadists have no qualms about using dirty bombs or worse to destroy what they see as our un-civilized, evil culture. That is why the appeasers amongst us must be continually pointed out and mocked (I’d like to do worse, but then I’m civilized, ha ha).
Since the tactics of some countries (like Iran) is to support small groups of terrorists and then deny any affiliation (it wasn’t us!), my foreign policy goes something like this; if there is any attack like 9/11 again or a dirty bomb or nuclear explosion in the United States, then Syria and Iran will cease to exist on this planet. You can hear the howls of protest already (we didn’t do it!). This approach is called punishing the whole class for the actions of one. It is time to put some pressure back on these bastards…
yubley on March 9, 2008 at 3:43 PM
Good thing we only reduced our aid to Hamas, good thing….
Seven Percent Solution on March 9, 2008 at 3:49 PM
But there’s ample evidence that much, if not most, of the Iranian populace is anti-regime and (roughly) pro-West and pro-US.
Whether that includes opposition to attacking Israel is another question.
SteveMG on March 9, 2008 at 3:53 PM
I would agree with that statement. I was thinking about Isreal vis-a-vis Gaza. Iran would be more difficult to justify that kind of action against. The US for instance, didn’t really need to broadly attack the population of Iraq. Of course, by not doing that we never really broke the will of the forces who would oppose us during our occupation. Thankfully, however, Al Queda did need to attack the population of Iraq in order to try and break their will.
Isreal, though, would need total capitulation by the population of Gaza in order to gain anything militarily. “Unconditional surrender” is a phrase that comes to mind. Of course, when you decimate population centers in winning victory in war, you have an obligation to make them whole again and rebuild. Isreal should pound the population of Gaza into submission and then show a little “self interest well understood” and reoccupy/rebuild Gaza. Anything other than total capitulation by the population will leave them to fight again, with the Islamists requesting a faux “cease fire” so they can regroup and fight again another day
BryanS on March 9, 2008 at 4:10 PM