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Fundamentalists Threaten Israel from All Sides

[Telegraph-UK] Con Coughlin - Hamas makes no secret of the fact that it now receives most of its financial and military support from Iran. The Iranian government signed a memorandum of understanding with the Hamas leadership in June last year in which it agreed to fund the militant group to the tune of £400 million. In addition, Iran provides military training to Hamas members by sending them to camps in Lebanon and Iran run by the elite Quds Force of the Revolutionary Guards. Earlier this year, the Iranians sought to establish new supply lines to Gaza. On February 24, Khaled Mashaal, Hamas' supreme leader, traveled to Khartoum where he met senior Quds Force officials and Sudanese politicians who are broadly sympathetic to Hamas' political objectives. The main topic of conversation was setting up a supply route that would enable Iran to smuggle rocket-propelled grenades, anti-tank missiles, guns and explosives through the porous border between Gaza and Egypt. Ordinary Palestinians, it is true, in both Gaza and the West Bank, are suffering hardship. But this is not because of a lack of funds entering the Palestinian territories: it is because successive Palestinian administrations have made no effort to distribute the resources available equably among the population. By forcing the majority of Palestinians to exist in dire poverty, Hamas succeeds in attracting widespread sympathy from international do-gooders who do not understand the sadistic economic manipulation that is taking place. Hamas is trying to replicate Hizbullah's success in Gaza, not a pleasing prospect for Israel, which now faces the threat of having two Iranian-backed, Islamic fundamentalist organizations dedicated to its destruction camped on its northern and southern borders.
2007-06-15 01:00:00
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