A senior Hamas official informed AFP on Sunday that the Palestinian Islamist motion had ample assets to proceed preventing Israel regardless of losses sustained over greater than 11 months of struggle in Gaza.
“The resistance has a excessive capacity to proceed,” Osama Hamdan informed AFP throughout an interview in Istanbul.
“There have been martyrs and there have been sacrifices… however in return there was an accumulation of experiences and the recruitment of latest generations into the resistance.”
His feedback got here lower than per week after Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant informed journalists that Hamas, whose October 7 assault triggered the struggle, “now not exists” as a army formation in Gaza.
“The variety of casualties… is far lower than what is predicted in a battle of this dimension, stage and breadth,” Hamdan stated on Sunday.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu launched retaliatory army operations to destroy Hamas after the group’s shock assault on southern Israel, which resulted within the deaths of 1,205 individuals, largely civilians, in keeping with an AFP tally based mostly on Israeli official figures.
The Israeli army marketing campaign has killed a minimum of 41,206 individuals in Gaza, in keeping with the Hamas-run territory’s well being ministry, which doesn’t present breakdowns of civilian and militant deaths.
Militants additionally seized 251 hostages on October 7, 97 of whom are nonetheless held in Gaza, together with 33 the Israeli army says are lifeless.
Netanyahu is dealing with mounting home stress to seal a deal through which hostages can be launched in change for Palestinian prisoners.
Israel’s announcement this month that the our bodies of six hostages had been recovered from a tunnel in Gaza after they have been “executed” by Hamas spurred an outpouring of grief and anger, resulting in a quick normal strike and large-scale demonstrations that continued in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem on Saturday evening.
However months of negotiations aimed toward securing a truce — mediated by the US, Egypt and Qatar — have apparently stalled.
Within the interview on Sunday, Hamdan stated the US, Israel’s most necessary army backer, was not doing sufficient to pressure concessions from Netanyahu that may finish the bloodshed.
“The American administration doesn’t exert adequate or applicable stress on the Israeli aspect,” Hamdan stated.
“Fairly it’s attempting to justify the Israeli aspect’s evasion of any dedication.”
Throughout two press conferences after officers introduced the deaths of the six hostages earlier this month, Netanyahu stated it was Hamas who refused to compromise and vowed “to not give in to stress” on remaining sticking factors.
He additionally stated Israel’s army marketing campaign had killed “a minimum of 17,000” Hamas militants.
– Israel ‘not immune’ –
The struggle between Israel and Iran-backed Hamas has drawn in different Iran-backed teams within the Center East, notably Lebanon-based Hezbollah and Huthi rebels in Yemen.
On Sunday the Huthis claimed a missile assault on central Israel that, whereas producing no casualties, triggered a rush to shelters and added to regional tensions.
Hamdan stated the assault confirmed the bounds of Israel’s capacity to defend itself, together with its oft-touted aerial defence system.
“It’s a message to the complete area that Israel shouldn’t be an immune entity,” Hamdan stated.
“Even Israeli capabilities have limits.”
Hamdan additionally reiterated Hamas’s view that an assault earlier this month through which a Jordanian truck driver shot lifeless three Israeli guards at a border crossing underscored widespread anger at Israel within the area.
As for Arab leaders who’ve normalised diplomatic ties with Israel or are contemplating doing so, Hamdan stated they need to ask themselves how they’d really feel if their international locations have been occupied and the world stood by and watched.
“Should you see Israel as a blessing and a achieve… give them a chunk of your nation,” he stated, jokingly including that it could possibly be referred to as “the brand new Israel”.
– ‘Day after’ planning –
Hamas has dominated Gaza since 2007, however with Israel calling for the group to be eradicated it’s unclear what type it’ll exist in after the struggle.
Hamdan stated on Sunday it was unattainable to think about a situation through which Hamas chief Yahya Sinwar would depart the besieged territory.
Sinwar and different leaders “are able to be martyred 1000’s of instances in Palestine somewhat than leaving it as a result of all the pieces he’s doing is to free Palestine,” Hamdan stated.
Hamas has demanded a whole Israeli withdrawal from Gaza, together with the Philadelphi hall, a slim strip of land alongside Egypt’s border that has emerged as a key sticking level within the truce talks.
Hamdan stated that Hamas desires “joint Palestinian rule” in Gaza, including that Hamas officers and representatives of different Palestinian factions would meet quickly in Cairo to debate their post-war imaginative and prescient.
“The day after the battle is a Palestinian day,” he stated.
