“The latest Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research poll shows that 71% of Gazans support the Hamas atrocities of Oct 7 and 56% expect Hamas to win the war. 62% in Gaza are happy with the performance of Hamas during the war and 59% want Hamas to stay in power.”
(Daniel Greenfield – Front Page) Americans expected Osama bin Laden to be found in a cave in Afghanistan. In reality, he was living comfortably in a military town in Pakistan under the protection of local authorities. Similarly, Israeli hostages, including the four who were last rescued, have come home telling stories of being kept captive in ‘civilian’ households.
In both cases we fundamentally misunderstood what Islamic terrorism is. It’s not a “fringe group of extremists”, as politicians and the media describe it, but an ethnic and religious movement. The religious values of Islamic terrorists are universally shared by the vast majority of Muslims, while the ethnic ones ground Islamic warfare in the interests of specific clans and families.