The European Court of Justice ruled last week that Hamas is not a terrorist group after all. The decision is the latest indication of Europe’s increasing embrace of the Palestinian cause and vexation with Israel.
The court in Luxembourg was not swayed by the fact that Hamas provoked a 50-day war with Israel this summer, firing thousands of rockets toward civilians in the hopes of terrorizing the population. Instead, the judges said the 2001 decision to label Hamas as a terror organization was “based not on acts examined and confirmed in decisions of competent authorities but on factual imputations derived from the press and the Internet.”
In other words, Hamas unfairly was designated a terror group because of false charges and media reports, not because it is committed to carrying out its charter’s mandate to destroy Israel and kill Jews, blamed as the cause of every war in the last several hundred years.
One can only conclude that the court’s ruling is based, at best, on a willful denial of reality. At worst it reeks of an anti-Israel bias. And it came on the same day the European Parliament, following the lead of parliaments in France, Britain and Ireland, voted to recognize Palestinian statehood “in principle,” in keeping with the Palestinian Authority’s drive for statehood at the United Nations without dealing directly with Israel.
In addition, the European Parliament decided not to establish a task force to counter the disturbing rise of anti-Semitism in Europe. The American Jewish Committee, which has called for such a task force, responded by calling the “inaction” an “inexcusable dereliction of duty.” David Harris, the executive director of the AJC, asserted that “anti-Semitic violence and attitudes have increased in key EU member states, and an increasing number of Jews wonder what the future holds for them. Yet the European Parliament refuses to establish a special body to deal with the resurgence of this ugly hatred targeting Jews — and, no less, core European values.”
The parliament did create a body to deal with racism and diversity in general, but Harris said the refusal to deal with anti-Semitism specifically indicated that some leaders “have yet to come to grips with the seriousness and uniqueness of this problem.”
In all, these actions, and inactions, from European leaders is a stark reminder that the international community appears bent on supporting the Palestinian cause, even including Hamas as a legitimate partner in running the proposed Palestinian state. And even as Europe fears the aggressive actions of other terror groups dedicated to Islamic jihad.
Who will convince the EU that Hamas is not their ally?
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