Mosab Hassan Yousef Quotes
Hamas thinks they can kill the will of people by intimidation. Most of those who are killed in the Gaza Strip for the suspicion of collaborating with Israel, have nothing to do with Israel.
Yousef, Mosab Hassan. Address to the UN Human Rights Council. UN Watch, 27 Sept. 2017.
This is one of the only times where a Palestinian politician criticized another Palestinian group for its violence and terrorism.
Hamas had fired thousands of rockets and other missiles at Israeli population centers—war crimes under the Geneva Conventions. Israel finally retaliated against Hamas facilities in Gaza. However, in an unprecedented effort to avoid civilian casualties, the Israeli Defense Forces warned the people by indicating which targets they were going to strike. They also dropped leaflets in Arabic telling the civilians that they are not the targets but to try and avoid harm to them and their families, they should evacuate the neighborhoods that would be under attack. Hamas had placed their missile launchers and other weapons in and near schools, hospitals, mosques and civilian housing risking their civilian population—see {640841}.
The Hamas leadership of the Gaza strip had fired thousands of rockets into Israel which their charter states should be eliminated. The Israelis after many being hit by more than a thousand rockets, used their military to attack (via the air) the Hamas leadership. However, Hamas had stored their rockets and their armaments in or very near civilian facilities including hospitals, schools, mosques and even UN humanitarian facilities. The Hamas leaders thereby made civilian facilities legitimate military targets under the Rules of War of the Geneva and Hague Conventions. So the Gaza leadership, instead of their military protecting their own civilians, used the civilians to protect the military and their weapons in the midst of war. The Secretary General also was referring to the Hamas leadership who had rejected at that point 5 different cease fires that had been proposed by the Egyptians, Americans, The Arab League and others. Israeli accepted them all.
Mosab Hassan Yousef is a Palestinian who worked undercover for Israel's internal security service Shin Bet from 1997 to 2007.
