Egyptian Journalist Ibrahim Eissa: Hamas Considers The Lives Of Palestinians Cheap, It Does Not Care How Many Palestinians Die; They Built Tunnels To Shelter Their Weapons, Instead Of Women And Children

Egyptian journalist Ibrahim Eissa criticized Hamas in his October 18, 2023 monologue on Al-Kahera wal Nas TV (Egypt), saying that Palestinian lives are cheap to them and they do not care about the Palestinian cause. He said that Hamas did not prepare bomb shelters in order to protect its women and children, rather, it has prepared underground tunnels in order to shelter its weapons and ammunition. Eissa said that the result of the October 7 attack is that Hamas is destroying the Palestinian cause altogether, "under the pretext of waging resistance." He warned that the result of the October 7 attack might be the emigration of more than a million Palestinians or the death of 10,000 Palestinians.

Ibrahim Eissa: "For 16 years, Hamas has been ruling the Gaza Strip with an iron fist, but has not dug and built any bomb shelters for the Palestinian civilians. The 3,000 people killed [in Gaza] – 64% of whom were women and children – could have been safe in bomb shelters now. Hamas dug tunnels and built an underground city, for its weapons, ammunitions, and its means of killing and destruction, but did not build bomb shelters for the living. Why? Because life is cheap to them.

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"The group behind the [October 7] attack is irresponsible. This is a group that does not take into any consideration whatsoever the lives of people or the future of the Palestinians and their cause. Neither me nor anybody else should defend this attack, or its truly sensational success so long as its outcome is so catastrophic.

"This attack has revealed that this group we are dealing with has not only hijacked Palestinian decision-making, but is losing Palestine altogether, under the pretext of waging resistance. The simple question is whether they should not wage resistance. I say, with all due respect: Don't.

"If this resistance leads to the destruction of the Palestinian cause... If this resistance leads to the emigration of 1.1 or 1.2 million people, nobody really knows the numbers yet... If as a result of this resistance 5,000 [Palestinians] will die... They say: 'But we killed 2,000 of them.' Really? Are our lives that cheap? Are lives so cheap that it does not matter if 5,000 or 10,000 of our people die, so long as we know that we killed 2,000 people from the other side? This is how [Hamas] views Palestinian lives. This is the culture of death they are possessed with."