Israel aided Hamas as a counterbalance to PLO

Since facts concerning covert operations are always hush-hush and easy to deny based on plausible deniability, I'd like to start off by quoting from the website "Israel Today" just to show that this information is not coming from an anti-semitic website.

The office of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert admitted on Wednesday that it is allowing the transfer of hundreds of millions of shekels to the Hamas government in the Gaza Strip every month.

Thursday, June 26, 2008 www.israeltoday.co.il...

Israel "aided Hamas directly -- the Israelis wanted to use it as a counterbalance to the PLO (Palestinian Liberation Organization)," said Tony Cordesman, Middle East analyst for the Center for Strategic Studies.

Israel's support for Hamas "was a direct attempt to divide and dilute support for a strong, secular PLO by using a competing religious alternative," said a former senior CIA official.

thy-weapon-of-war.blogspot.com...

It seems like the strategy behind the funding was to divide and conquer the more dangerous PLO (Palestinian Liberation Organization) which was called a terrorist organization much like Hamas. The PLO, if it still exists, does not make headlines as often as Hamas, so if the PLO was eliminated via Hamas, and now Hamas is turning against Israel, it seems to be an indication of "blowback" which happens quite often with covert operations (much like America is suffering blowback from the CIA funded taliban)

the Israeli public was conditioned to hearing that the Hamas terrorists are the "extremists," and therefore the Israeli regime felt compelled to promise a complete cutoff of funds from Jewish taxpayers to the newly elected Hamas regime.

www.jtf.org...

Whether the cutoff occurred or not, politicians usually only promise such actions when public outcry becomes deafening, more evidence that the political state had to succumb to the public's wishes and stop funding of Hamas.

There is no doubt that the New Israel Fund means well - or at least many of its members and contributors do. But there is also no doubt that the New Israel Fund supports or collects funds for some of the most odious organizations in Israel - organizations whose goals have nothing to do with democracy and nothing to do with peace - organizations whose only goal is to besmirch Israel and to destroy Zionism and the Jewish state.

zionism-israel.com...

This quote also comes from a pro-zionist website, accusing the New Israel Fund of funding anti-zionist organizations like Hamas. The New Israel Fund on their website states "New Israel Fund is the leading organization committed to equality and democracy for all Israelis." The author states that the NIF means well but they are perhaps indirectly funding anti-zionist organizations.

If Israel does in fact fund Hamas, and if Israel acts in any way similar to their "special friend" the U.S. and CIA, then it is not much of a stretch to assume that Hamas, much like the Taliban and al Qaeda, are funded and controlled by intelligence operatives. Given the fact that Hamas' rockets routinely land in empty fields and hurt very few to zero casualties, especially Israeli casualties, yet these actions prompt international outrage and justification for Israel to bomb Palestine, it is safe to assume that these attacks are either false flag or directly controlled by Israel to justify security measures and keep the Israeli people in a state of fear.

Just remember, if you call me anti-semitic for pointing this out, what do you call those who act to keep the Jewish people in a state of fear while claiming to be protectorates of Israel?

Well said, nothing anti-semetic in that at all, they'll probably still ban you for some made up reason though. It is interesting to see them funding the people they are fighting. It's quite transparent, and with the release of the "Palestine Papers" things are really heating up, people are starting to pick sides, and it looks to me if finally, the people of Gaza might actually have a hope for a state of their own, and a slim chance of peace.

I honestly believe Israel and Palestine and peacefully coexist. Arabs and Jews lived there before in peace, and can do so again. The playing field needs to be level, the support to Israel should be matched with nation building programs for Palestine. I honestly believe that if you give those people even a modest increase in their quality of life, you'll see less people swayed into fighting.

I still say that if I was in Gaza I'd be fighting the occupation myself. It's a vicious cycle, Israel mistreats the Palestinians because they are worried they are terrorists, and by subjecting them to this treatment then ensure they germinate an entire generation of terrorists.

reply to post by filosophia


I have heard rumors of this for years, it's funny that these guys get the kicks out of admitting their own illegal activities and to being hypocrites. These guys have their nose in everyone's business.

I am sure you know this already, but the Israeli secret force is called Mossad and their motto is...'By Way of Deception". So it does not surprise me that an organization that goes by this motto would commit such crimes.

Members, please don't freeking call me a Hamas supporter!

I guess this issue is too hot for the Megaphonies to touch.

Or are they awaiting instructions from the ADL?

reply to post by Kailassa


Yeah I am surprised they are not all over this one yet. Someone should call them in !

reply to post by filosophia


There are two options here- Either you misunderstood what you read, and selectively quoted by accident, or you're knowingly misquoting, taking articles out of context, and lying.

Israel has funded Hamas to destabilize the PLO in the 70's back when it was a charity organisation (Yes, it used to be a charity group). Hamas then transitioned into an armed group, buying guns and whatnot, hid that fact from Israel, while still getting its money.

That's a fact, but that doesn't mean Israel ever expected anything like that.

Then you have this crazy pro Zionist articles claiming Israel is funding terrorists-

Wrong again.

One talks about Israel funding left wing groups that oppose certain moves made by the Israeli government- Oh no! Freedom of expression in Israel! (something which you conveniently left out of your quote).

The other two talk about aid money transfarred to the people of Gaza by Israel, and banking services given to the people of Gaza by Israel- Oh, the humanity..

So you see, you've got it all wrong, either on purpose, or just by an honest mistake (a very selective world view).

Sad to see I'm the only one who bothered to read the links.

And here's the long proof, quoted out of your links (only different parts)-

Olmert and Livni claimed that the Jewish tax dollars would be given for the "humanitarian needs" of the Arab Muslim Nazis, and not for the Hamas terrorists.

That is another Bolshevik lie. The billions of dollars given from 1993 to 2006 to the Fatah-PLO terrorist regime went directly to the personal bank accounts of Arafat and the other Muslim terrorist leaders. When Arafat the pedophile died of AIDS, he was a multibillionaire with an estimated $10 billion in his Swiss bank accounts - money given to him by Israel, the United States, Europe and Japan for the "humanitarian needs" of the Arabs in Judea, Samaria and the Gaza District.

Documents recovered during an Israeli anti-terrorist operation in Ramallah revealed that Arafat used the money given to him for "humanitarian needs" to fund Islamic suicide bombings and other acts of Muslim terrorist mass murder.

www.jtf.org...

EVIL!

But there is also no doubt that the New Israel Fund supports or collects funds for some of the most odious organizations in Israel - organizations whose goals have nothing to do with democracy and nothing to do with peace - organizations whose only goal is to besmirch Israel and to destroy Zionism and the Jewish state.


Zochrot is one example of these organizations. It organizes activities to perpetuate the myth that Israel was founded by "ethnic cleansing" of hapless and peaceful Palestinians who were minding their own business in 1948 - the Palestine Nakba myth. Its brochure claims that Israel expelled over 700,000 Palestinians in 1948. Its Web site links to the BADIL organization, that is dedicated to blocking any solution to the Palestinian refugee problem other than return to original (nonexisting) homes in Israel. New Israel fund also supports the innocently named "Coalition of Women for Peace" which is likewise involved in the delegitimation of Israel and Zionism, as well as New Profile, an organization noted for encouraging draft dodging.

zionism-israel.com...

Oh no! Freedom of expression in Israel!

(The Hamas part you seem to have made up)

Israel and Hamas may currently be locked in deadly combat, but, according to several current and former U.S. intelligence officials, beginning in the late 1970s, Tel Aviv gave direct and indirect financial aid to Hamas over a period of years.

Israel "aided Hamas directly -- the Israelis wanted to use it as a counterbalance to the PLO (Palestinian Liberation Organization)," said Tony Cordesman, Middle East analyst for the Center for Strategic Studies.

thy-weapon-of-war.blogspot.com...

In the 70's, back when Hamas was a charity organisation! Way to take things out of context.

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton spoke this evening with Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and thanked him for his decision to transfer NIS 175 million ($43 million) in cash to the Gaza Strip.

The funds, to be transferred immediately, are intended to be pay the salaries of Palestinian Authority workers in the Gaza Strip.

It's those kind of things that insane pro Zionist sites refer to as "funding Hamas".

www.ynetnews.com...

reply to post by Eliad


Get real. Someone get this guy a cup of coffee!

It will all be okay one day, just keep drinking the cool-aid.

I will be right back, I need to scrounge up some tax dollars to send to Israel. My lunch money wasn't enough

reply to post by filosophia
I think the real target is Palestinian nationalism.

from a January 26, 2006 interview by Amy Goodman of Democracy Now of Robert Dreyfuss, author of the new book Devil’s Game: How the United States Helped Unleash Fundamentalist Islam.

How Israel and the United States Helped to Bolster Hamas
So the Egyptian authorities arrested a man and put him in jail in 1965, named Ahmed Yassin. Ahmed Yassin, of course, is the founder of Hamas. He was, in turn—we’ll get to the end of the story—was killed by Israel a couple of years ago. But in 1965, he was put in jail by the Egyptian authorities. And then, two years later, of course, when Israel occupied Gaza and the West Bank and, of course, the Sinai peninsula after the 1967 War, the Israelis released Ahmed Yassin and a number of other Muslim Brotherhood leaders.

And starting in 1967, the Israelis began to encourage or allow the Islamists in the Gaza and West Bank areas, among the Palestinian exiled population, to flourish. The statistics are really quite staggering. In Gaza, for instance, between 1967 and 1987, when Hamas was founded, the number of mosques tripled in Gaza from 200 to 600. And a lot of that came with money flowing from outside Gaza, from wealthy conservative Islamists in Saudi Arabia and elsewhere. But, of course, none of this could have happened without the Israelis casting an approving eye upon it.

And during these years, during that 20-year span, the Hamas organization was a bitter opponent of Palestinian nationalism, clashed repeatedly with the P.L.O. and with Fatah, of course, refused to participate in the P.L.O. umbrella. And just as during the '50s and ’60s, the Muslim Brotherhood fought against the Nasserists, the Baath Party, the communists and the rest of the Arab left, in the 1970s and ’80s, the Muslim Brotherhood fought against the Palestinian national movement. Now that's not even a surprise, you know. In 1970, when the king of Jordan launched his massive counter-offensive against the Palestinians there in that event called Black September, the Muslim Brotherhood was a strong supporter of the king and actually backed his effort, which resulted in thousands of Palestinians killed in a virtual civil war in Jordan.
. . .
Well, the United States, of course, has had one constant, that it was a major supporter of Israel and considered Israel an ally, so anything that looked like Palestinian nationalism was seen as a threat to Israel, and the United States, as you might expect, like Israel, refused to even discuss or admit the existence, during those early years, of Palestinians as a force or Palestinian nationalism.

This whole interview should be read of course. The Palestinians never even had a chance to exercise an actual nationalist movement until after the 1967 war. They, the people, were nonentities while the "big powers" decided their fate. British before 1948, Jordan and Egypt before 1967. Then, just as the window of opportunity for a genuine people's independence movement opened, party divisions occur.

The 1967 Six Day War
The war profoundly changed Israel itself, says historian Anita Shapira, of the Chaim Weizmann Institute for the Study of Zionism in Tel Aviv. It led to the emergence of a strong mythic movement that claimed the West Bank as part of greater Israel.

In the months after the Six Day War, Palestinian guerrilla leader Yasser Arafat organized an insurrection in the West Bank. It failed, but it brought about a shift in the outlook of the Palestinians, says Yezid Sayigh, author of Armed Struggle and the Search for State: The Palestinian National Movement, 1945-1993. "This in a sense catapulted the general Palestinian public into the arms of the guerrillas because they'd seen that the people they'd hinged their hopes on -- the Arab leaders and the armies they'd believed in -- had been swept aside in a matter of days.

"And here came along a bunch of young men who jumped into the West Bank and the Gaza Strip (and) said: 'We're going to take matters into our own hands. The Palestinians will stand up and fight for themselves. We're going to transform ourselves from being destitute refugees waiting for charity handouts from the U.N. and turn ourselves into freedom-fighters, people with dignity.'"

So there’s plenty of evidence that the Israeli intelligence services, especially Shin Bet and the military occupation authorities, encouraged the growth of the Muslim Brotherhood and the founding of Hamas. There are many examples and incidents of that. But there were armed clashes, of course, on Palestinian university campuses in the ’70s and ’80s, where Hamas would attack P.L.O., PFLP, PDFLP and other groups, with clubs and chains. This was before guns became prominent in the Occupied Territories.

Even that, however—there’s a very interesting and unexplained incident. Yassin(founder of Hamas) was arrested in 1983 by the Israelis. On search of his home, they found a large cache of weapons. This would have been a fairly explosive event, but for unexplained reasons, a year later Yassin was quietly released from prison. He said at the time that the guns were being stockpiled not to fight the Israeli occupation authorities, but to fight other Palestinian factions.
www.democracynow.org...