Hamas, was and remains renowned, frankly, for its extensive work in building up an education network, its scholarships, youth camps, sporting activities, care for the elderly, sponsorship of light industry, and for its diligent work to bolster a desperately needed healthcare infrastructure.
Its meaningful and effective charitable work has been reported even by Western media, especially in the zakath, the benevolent gift to families bereft through violence of a loved one.
This all sounds quite admirable.
Prominent among the newly elected politicians was Mariam Farahat - affectionately known as Um Nidal – her stoicism in the tragic loss of three of her six sons endeared her to Palestinians, and admirers throughout the world.
The president of Al-Quds University, a moderate, praised her character with the following: “What comes to mind as I listen to sister Um Nidal is the verse 'Paradise is under the feet of the mothers'. Praise is due to this woman, and to every Palestinian mother...” Point is, she was an example.
So. Mariam Farahat, called Um Nidal – -- “mother of the struggle.” She became famous when she was filmed sending her 17 year old son Mohammed off to kill Jews. She is seen ordering him “not to return except as a martyr for Allah.” That is, dead.
Off he went and showered a lecture hall with gunfire, lobbing grenades, murdering five students and wounding 24 others. The following year another son, Nidhal, was killed while preparing to attack Israeli troops. Two years after that, in 2005, a third son, Rawad, was killed while transporting Kassam rockets for use against Jews – any Jew.
After young Mohammed’s death, 17 years old, Um - "Mother" - said, “My son is not dearer than Islam. I have offered him as a gift and a sacrifice to Allah, may He be glorified, and to His true faith..." After her election 1n 2006, she said that her three remaining sons would follow in their 3 dead brothers' footsteps, if necessary.
And her party, Hamas. "Zeal". Known as I noted, for effective government, and charitable work. And also for its terrorist activities. It was the gigantic brain behind that spate of suicide bombings, and it paid a reward, that charitable zakath, to the families of such bomb “martyrs.”
In the three and a half years prior to its becoming a government, it arranged 425 attacks, killing 377 Israeli citizens and soldiers and wounding 2,076 others.
As a campaign promise, Hamas' leader Mahmoud al-Zahar pronounced that under his government, "every citizen will be required to act in accordance with the codes of Islamic law." Including the "unbeliever tax", in Bethlehem.
The charter of Hamas calls for the extermination of Israel and for its replacement with an Islamist theocracy. The charter states,
"There is no solution for the Palestinian question except through Jihad. Initiatives, proposals and international conferences are all a waste of time and vain endeavors." It informs us that "The Zionist invasion is a vicious invasion.... It relies greatly in its infiltration and espionage operations on the secret organizations it gave rise to, such as the Freemasons, The Rotary and Lions clubs, and other sabotage groups. All these organizations … work in the interest of Zionism and according to its instructions..." The Jews’ scheme “is embodied in ‘The Protocols of the Elders of Zion’…" that clownish czarist forgery that hitler loved so
So.
Hagar was Abraham’s scorned other wife. She raised rejected Ishmael, who is counted now as father to the Arabs. Abraham, father abraham, sent hagar and his biological firstborn out into the wilderness, to die, except that an angel saved them.
What seed of bitterness was planted in Ishmael's 13 year old heart, to last so long. Today, well, 40 years ago, another Hagar, Um Nidal, bore sons, whom she aimed and loosed like arrows of flame into the heart of Israel.
Twenty years ago, nearly, when I heard of this woman in Palestine, laying out her sons as a blood sacrifice to Allah, some dull serpent stirred in the back of my memory.
Medea, Medea from Greek mythology -- the forsaken wife of Jason, of the Argonauts. In Euripides' tragic play, Medea has effected the murders of several enemies. Her final revenge will be on Jason himself, her betraying husband,and the instrument shall be his -- their -- sons. She turns to them, in the play, and after many musings she says:
You will nevermore your mother see,
Nor live as ye have done beneath her eye.
Alas, my sons, why do you gaze on me,
Why smile upon your mother that last smile?
-- a moment’s wavering, then she steels herself --
Shall I let my foes
Triumph, that I may let my friends go free?
I'll brace me to the deed. …
By the avengers that in Hades reign,
It never shall be said that I have left
My children for my foes to trample on.
It is decreed.
And off she rushes to butcher her children. Off stage, we hear their screams.
There’s something reptilian here, some affinity between the woman and the serpent.
There’s something so unclean in all of this. What can we think, in the presence of such horror? Who can we blame? Well, mothers, of course. But fathers too. Isn’t anyone sane?
Men must be faithful to their wives. Fathers must be faithful to their sons. But blessed Abraham, father of nations, faithful to his God, was faithless to his Ishmael – and this failure remains a curse unto the nations to this very day. We mustn’t blame Abraham , though. His rejection, betrayal, is four thousand years ago - 3984 years, to be precise. And we really ought to find some more relevant scapegoat, don’t you suppose?
Euripides tells us, through his Chorus, his dark authoritative conclusion:
Many a hopeless matter gods arrange.
What we expected never came to pass,
What we did not expect the gods brought to bear.
So the Greeks would have it. An easy answer. Let’s blame God.
I think a truer answer is to blame human nature. But all that does is confirm that there is no solution to the problem. Which means it's not a problem. Which in itself is a problem. See? Back to snakes. Snakes eating their own tails. The way mothers devour their sons, and fathers reject them.
Ten years ago Umm Nidal was ushered to her reward, kicking and screaming. She died of massive organ failure. As if her body exploded in on itself.
J
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