The following is the opposite of the tailored message presented by the Western news media. And yet, these are the voices of large numbers of Arabs, most of them Muslims, speaking about Hamas, Hizbullah, Islam and the Quran, Israel and the Jews, and protestors.
Jabalya refugees
A: “May Allah take revenge on those who injured us and killed us. Hamas is responsible for this destruction.”
B: “Hamas ruined our lives, our children’s lives, our homes. We used to have life. All the people hate Hamas. If we talk and they find out, we are dead. The people are miserable victims. Hamas are terrorists. I was happy when I heard Israel killed Sinwar. Hamas brought us nakba [a great tragedy].
“All good came from Israel. My husband used to work there. Israel is a blessing.
“Finish Hamas, these liars. We don’t want them. You are the just. May Allah return all the Israeli children home. May there be peace and coexistence. We left our homes, now you finish Hamas!
“Hamas, leave us alone. We don’t want you. You sucked our blood. Hamas are not our children. Hamas took my son from me. What had he done? Look what Hamas has done to Gaza. Our kids died. Where is our land, our assets, our money? It’s all gone. We lost everything.”
C: “Hamas stole all the humanitarian aid. Villain government of Hamas. Terrorist government of Hamas.”
D: “We were not happy on October 7. We were only happy [before October 7] when the border crossings were open and allowed us to work in Israel.”
E: “Hamas is by far weaker now. But we are still afraid of them. I see the Israeli soldiers giving water to kids and women. The Jews show humanity. Hamas wouldn’t have given us a drop of water. They would let us die.”
F: “Hamas killed us. May Allah bring them a nakba. The Jews are far better. The Jews gave us food and a humanitarian safe corridor.”
G: “Hamas shot us. I lost my leg. They stole our aid. We have nothing to eat. They steal and hide. All because I wanted to feed my kids. That Hamas politician eats well in Qatar and look at us.
“Everybody says the IDF [Israel Defense Forces] are criminals, but the IDF were the only ones who took care of me and gave me medical treatment, water and food. May Allah protect the IDF. Israel brings in food and Hamas steals it. Israel is humane.”
Rawan Osman
“Growing up in Lebanon, I was fond of Hizbullah. I thought they are heroes who save us whenever Israel attacks us. I had never met or seen a Jew until my mid-20s, when I moved to France and lived among Jews. And the first time I saw four religious Jewish men, I had a panic attack. That moment changed my life, because I’m not a fearful person. Why did I behave this way? They didn’t even look at me.
“This brainwashing process we went through, it led to many deaths, it led to senseless wars. And that, especially as a mother, fills me with rage. It has to stop. The atrocities which took place on October 7, [2023], are condoned, justified and even celebrated. Baklava was distributed on the streets in Berlin in Germany, where I live. How insane is that, celebrating what? I am a recovered antisemite.
“Many Arabs and Westerners are antisemitic. They hate the Jews. They believe the Protocols of the Elders of Zion is a legitimate book. They believe the Jews hate everybody except their own people. Listen to the Israelis, not to Al-Jazeera [news network].
“Many Lebanese understand this war is not between Lebanon and Israel, it’s between Israel and Hizbullah. We want Damascus to look like Dubai, not like Gaza. And we want peace with the Israelis. The Jews never harmed us.”
Abdullah Al-Hadlaq
“Israel is an independent sovereign state and not a terror organization. There is no occupation. There is a people returning to their promised land. The history of the Israelites is ancient, predating Islam. Therefore, we Muslims must acknowledge that the Israelites have a right to that land.
“When the State of Israel was established in 1948, there was no state called ‘Palestine.’ It didn’t exist.
“Why shouldn’t we live in peaceful coexistence with Israel and cooperate with it?”
Loay Alshareef
“The biggest misinformation is describing the Jews as conquerors (or foreign colonialists) on their ancestral homeland, a homeland that their Jewish ancestors lived in. Many Muslims are named Daniel in Saudi Arabia without making the connection that the name itself is Hebrew, meaning ‘God judges.’ This prophet is from the line of Judah, who was living in exile.
“Israel has always been there, but the fact that Jews are sovereign in their national homeland is an idea that doesn’t fit with a narrative that views Jews and Christians as always subjugated.
“So, this is the real problem with those who refuse the existence of Israel. It was never about the borders of Israel in 1948 or 1967. It’s about the existence of Israel itself.”
Sheikh Ahmad Adwan
“There is no such thing as ‘Palestine’ in the Quran. Allah has assigned the Holy Land to the Children of Israel until the Day of Judgment (Sura 5:21), and said, ‘We made the Children of Israel the inheritors [of the land]’ (Sura 26:59).
“Your demand for the Land of Israel is a falsehood and constitutes an attack on the Quran, on the Jews and their land. Therefore, you won’t succeed, and Allah will fail you and humiliate you, because Allah is the one who will protect them [the Jews].
“The Palestinians are the killers of children, the elderly and women. They attack the Jews and then they use Gazan [children, elderly and women] as human shields and hide behind them, without mercy for their children as if they weren’t their own children, in order to tell the public that the Jews intended to kill them.
“[The Jews] are peaceful people, who are not hostile, not aggressors, but if they are attacked, they defend themselves while causing as little damage to the attackers as possible.”
Lucy Aharish
“The state of Israel is under attack. Our beloved country is under attack. We are under the attack of a brutal, barbaric and inhumane terror organization.
“Hamas murdered and slaughtered innocent babies, children, elderly, women and men in cold blood. Hamas has fired thousands of rockets and missiles at innocent people, civilians, citizens of the sovereign state of Israel.
“And we, citizens of the State of Israel, all of us, right and left, secular and religious, Jews, Christians, Druze, Muslims, minorities and immigrants from around the world, are united in this fight. We are fighting for our lives, for our future and mostly for the future of our children.
“Don’t be mistaken, we experience difficulties, disagreements, and major disputes like any other country on this globe. But it does not mean that we will not protect ourselves and our children, our homeland.”
Amjad Taha
“Since April 15, 2003, up to this moment, the Muslim Brotherhood-led army in Sudan has been carrying out airstrikes against their own people, killing 80,000 children and women. They destroyed schools, hospitals and churches. They burned and destroyed mosques, too. They bombarded every place. According to the United Nations, five million people in Sudan are starving and 200,000 of those are children that might die.
“Tell me, how many of those students [Western demonstrators] have posted even once [on social media] about those children? All those are human beings. How many people protested about these people or those children? Don’t they deserve any support, any protest, any media attention?
“These [protestors] are just following the trend. It’s not about humanity. They don’t care about Palestine. They don’t know what Palestine is, they don’t know anything about the Palestinians, they don’t know anything about the Muslims who are living in Israel. They don’t know about the 12 Arab members represented in the parliament of Israel who are elected democratically. They don’t know about the 300 mosques in Israel and the 400 imams. They don’t know about these things.
“What connects all these Hamas- and Hizbullah-glorifiers? It is antisemitism. They’re all antisemites.”