2 days ago
Columnist In Palestinian Authority Daily: Gazans Must Rise Up Against Hamas, Demand The Release Of The Israeli Hostages, And That Hamas Withdraw From The Political Scene To End The War
In his August 9, 2025 column in the Palestinian Authority (PA) daily Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, journalist Bassem Barhoum wrote that there was only one hope for ending the war in Gaza: the Palestinian public in Gaza must rise up and take to the streets to demand the release of the Israeli hostages and the withdrawal of Hamas from the political scene. Barhoum argues that Hamas is not a national Palestinian movement at all, but a branch of the Muslim Brotherhood that serves "its own interests and those of its regional allies" rather than the national interests of the Palestinian people. Hamas's coup against the PA in 2007, he adds, created a crisis that led to "a nakba more serious than the first nakba" of 1948.[1]
Bassem Barhoum (Image:
The following are translated excerpts from his column:[2]
"On the night between Thursday and Friday [August 7-8, 2025], the Israeli war cabinet decided to occupy the entire Gaza Strip. This large-scale military operation could last several months and perhaps even more than a year. However, if it ends with an Israeli occupation of the Strip, we will have to understand that Gaza has been completely destroyed… and that the Gaza Strip may lose its Palestinian national identity for many decades to come. This scenario inevitably compels us to question the fate of the Strip, as well as the fate of the long and bitter Palestinian struggle for an independent state and of the Palestinian cause as a whole.
"There are many additional questions, but the important of them at the moment is: How can we avoid all this and avoid the elimination of our national cause? What makes this a difficult task in the present Palestinian reality is that Hamas does not think or act based on national Palestinian premises. [It thinks and acts] based on the premises of the Muslim Brotherhood and its own interests and those of its regional allies. The Palestinian people is trapped between the two jaws of a predator that is crushing our bones and our future. One jaw is the extremist Zionist right-wing stream [in Israel]… and the other is the global [Muslim] Brotherhood organization…
"We must find some way or some action that will preempt the Israeli war machine, and in this context I believe that [UN] conferences and useless Security Council meetings are unable to stop the great slaughter…
"After Hamas led the Palestinian people into a deep crisis following the 2006 elections [and its military coup against the PA in 2007] – a crisis that has now led us to a nakba more serious than the first nakba [of 1948] – we find that we were wrong to allow two parallel paths to remain, paths that do not meet and can never meet because the disagreement between them is essential, namely the national Palestinian path and the Islamist path of the [Muslim] Brotherhood…[3]
"There may be one and only one hope [for Gaza]: the Palestinian public in Gaza – all of it or at least most of it – must rise up, take to the streets en masse and demand that Hamas release the [Israeli] hostages without delay and withdraw from the entire political scene. This may be difficult and may involve some risk, but it is the only chance to avoid total devastation, killing and expulsion. If anyone has a different solution, let him share it with all of us… In my opinion, today this is the [only] feasible solution that may put a stop to the war."
