Tuesday, April 01, 2008

In the War of Ideas: Hamas Propagates Message of Violence, Hatred   [Steve Schippert]

With seemingly every breath, Hamas propagates a message of bigoted hatred and violence. There is an excellent column today in the New York Times on precisely this subject. (However, the headline  In Gaza, Hamas’s Insults to Jews Complicate Peace does it a gross disservice. The headline will cause many to wonder "what peace?," or just where Qassam barrages and Katyusha rains fall on the scale of "complicating peace.") But forgive the poorly chosen headline, as the story is as important as it is outstanding.

“If you take a sample on Friday, you’re bound to hear incitement against the Jews in the prayers and the imam’s sermon,” said Mkhaimer Abusada, a political scientist at Al Azhar University here. “He uses verses from the Koran to say how the Jews were the enemies of the prophet and didn’t keep their promises to the prophet 1,400 years ago.”

Mr. Abusada is a Muslim and political independent. “You have young people, and everyone has to listen to the imam whether you believe him or not,” he said. “By saying the same thing over and over, you find a lot of people believing it, especially when he cites the Koran or hadith,” the sayings of the prophet.

Radwan Abu Ayyash, deputy minister of culture in Ramallah, ran the Palestinian Broadcasting Company until 2005. Hamas “uses religious language to motivate simple people for political as well as religious goals,” he said. “People don’t distinguish between the two.” He said he found a lot of what Al Aksa broadcast “disgusting and unprofessional.”

Every Palestinian thinks the situation in Gaza is ugly, he said. “But what is not fine is to build up children with a culture of hatred, of closed minds, a culture of sickness. I don’t think they always know what they are creating. People use one weapon, language, without realizing that they also use it against themselves.”

In writing the story, Steven Erlanger turned to and references, among others, Itimar Marcus of Palestinian Media Watch, a group that tirelessly monitors, archives and analyzes the various Palestinian communications media, including Hamas's various outlets. Here is the latest from Palestinian Media Watch, a clip of a children's program in which a fairly lengthy puppet show depicts a young Palestinian child denigrating and then stabbing President Bush.

'Hashami Street' (my term) is a long way from Sesame Street. One can almost imagine the announcer closing out the program with, "Hashami Street was brought to you today by the number 72, the letter P, the sons of pigs and monkeys, and the corpse of the impure American President George Bush."

Sound outlandish? Remind yourself that you just watched a puppet show aimed at Palestinian children that depicts a stabbing to and offers their young minds no short list of justifications for such hatred and violence. Then the same children walk down the street and are inundated with what message, per chance? You got it.

Be sure to read the complete article by Steven Erlanger today.

04/01 09:20 PMShare