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Hamas Makes It Clear It Has No Interest in Peace with Israel
(National Post-Canada) Amb. Vivian Bercovici - For the past seven months, Hamas has organized riots at the border with Israel. Many among the international press have accepted the Hamas rendering of these gatherings as "peaceful," even though photos and video clearly show an overwhelmingly young, male crowd, many of whom are armed with firebombs, knives and grenades, who aspire to overrun the Israeli border, murder and maim civilians, and then liberate all of Palestine from Israeli rule. There is nothing peaceful about these gatherings. Compounding the immediate dangers posed by the riots is Hamas' launching of arson weapons that have incinerated Israeli farmland and nature preserves. Curiously, there never seem to be riots in Gaza protesting the diversion of tens of millions of dollars of aid intended for civilian use to the advanced military infrastructure developed by Hamas, as well as weapon production and acquisition. Last week, Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh said that the riots at the Gaza border will continue until the "siege on Jerusalem, Al-Aqsa and all the lands of Palestine is lifted." There is zero ambiguity here. Hamas leaders are pledging the destruction of all of Israel, even within the 1967 borders. The writer is a former Canadian ambassador to Israel.