Osama Hamdan: Surprises await the occupation in the West Bank and negotiations do not need new initiatives | News

Osama Hamdan, a leader in the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas), said that the ceasefire negotiations in the Gaza Strip do not need new initiatives to negotiate them, because all previous projects failed due to the lack of a guarantee that Israel would accept them. He added that the coming days will reveal surprises in the West Bank that the occupation does not want, and that they will drive nails into its coffin.

Hamdan added – in a comprehensive interview with Tel Aviv Tribune Net that will be published later – that the United States is not exerting real pressure on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to accept the American proposals that Hamas had previously announced its approval of.

The Hamas leader denied that there were direct negotiations with the United States, separate from Israel, and said, “We heard in the media that there was American talk about a direct deal with Hamas, but until now there has been nothing practical. The Americans have not contacted us directly, nor have they sent anything of the sort through mediators.”

The guest and the home front

Regarding the Israeli statements about the success of the occupation army in assassinating Hamas leader Mohammed Deif, Hamdan stressed that “Brother Abu Khaled (Mohammed Deif) is fine, and is still at work and performing his role as a leader of the resistance. All the rumors that were published did not push him back, and he is still in his position performing his role. Despite the passage of more than 330 days of fighting, neither he, nor his soldiers, nor his staff have shown any determination, nor has their will wavered.”

The Hamas leader attributed the cohesion of the internal front in the Gaza Strip to a number of factors, the most important of which are:

• The Palestinian people have been committed to their cause for nearly 75 years. Fathers pass the cause on to their sons and then to their grandchildren, despite the harsh conditions and horrors that this people have experienced.
• This people linked themselves and their cause with God, and thus a state of faith, certainty and submission developed within them, which prompted them to work more to achieve the goal, which is liberation.
• The resistance emerged from the fabric of the Palestinian people, and did not separate from it. It created within it an environment of resistance consisting of the son, the brother, and the sibling.
• The resistance targeted the occupation army that oppresses the people, and then the Palestinian people saw it as a symbol of revenge for the crimes committed against them.
• The resistance knows today that it is better than yesterday, and it learns in the field how to develop its performance and embrace its people who always rally around it.
• The resistance focused its battle on its goals against the occupation and did not get carried away in side battles that would arouse a lot of anger and sensitivities against it.

Why Sinwar?

Hamdan denied that the selection of Yahya Sinwar as head of the political bureau in Hamas came in response to the assassination of Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran, “because it was not done in a personal, individual way of revenge,” but rather there are criteria included in the movement’s internal regulations, and there are conditions that must be met by any leader elected to lead it.

When asked about the changes that Hamas witnessed after Sinwar assumed its leadership, the movement’s leader said, “Every leader has his own way of managing business, and Brother Abu Ibrahim (Sinwar) began working directly in managing the movement and arranging the situation at the leadership level in a way that does not give the enemy the opportunity to cause any disruption in its leadership.”

He added that “a state of leadership stability has emerged despite the shock that occurred as a result of the assassination of the movement’s leader, Abu al-Abd (Ismail) Haniyeh, may God have mercy on him,” and that “he and the leaders with him are now managing the movement’s affairs in a stable manner and in the same direction that it has always followed.”

Authority and the West Bank

Regarding the current events in the West Bank, Hamdan said – in his interview with Tel Aviv Tribune Net – that the Israeli occupation was planning to deport two million Palestinians from the West Bank to Jordan, and “this project is very dangerous not only for the Palestinians, but for the entire region, as it represents an explosion and instability.”

He added that the current escalation in the West Bank has not succeeded in undermining the resistance action, “and that the coming days will reveal that the reality of the West Bank will be completely different from what the occupation wants,” and that it “will drive nails into the occupation’s coffin.”

The Hamas leader referred to the resistance’s relations in Gaza with the Palestinian Authority, and spoke about the political initiative related to the priorities of the battle and the mechanism of joint Palestinian action to reach a national consensus government that runs all of Palestine and in which Hamas participates and is part of it.

He also spoke about the accusations against the resistance and its carrying out of Operation Flood of Al-Aqsa on October 7, 2023, which led to the Israeli aggression on Gaza that has been ongoing for 11 months. He also discussed the extent of Hamas’s readiness to hand over the administration of the Strip to a new elected authority.

He also touched on the issues of the Israeli prisoners held by the resistance and its ability to protect them despite the killing of some of them, and the extent of the resistance fighters’ steadfastness in the battlefield, in addition to many other issues addressed in the dialogue.