‘Greetings to the free people of the world’: Yahya Sinwar in his own words
An image of Yahya Sinwar sitting on a chair held during an ‘All Out for Palestine’ protest against Israeli arms funding, at New York Public Library in New York City on 18 October 2024
Khaled Hroub writes in Middle East Eye on 21 October 2024:
This past week, millions around the world watched drone footage of Yahya Sinwar’s final moments as he defiantly fought against Israel until he was killed in Rafah on 16 October.
The late Hamas leader in Gaza, who spent 22 years in an Israeli prison from 1989 until his release in 2011 as part of a prisoner exchange, has been vilified by Israeli, American and western mainstream media.
US Vice President Kamala Harris even praised the Israeli military’s killing of Sinwar, who was 61. Hamas is proscribed as a terrorist group in the US, UK and the EU.
The western depiction of resistance leaders as “terrorists” is not new but a repugnant legacy of colonial times. In Palestine, early British colonialists, their Zionist surrogates and the ensuing Israeli state described every Palestinian nationalist leader as a terrorist.
But for Palestinians, such labels of “terrorism” are simply worthless. To them, Sinwar belongs to a long list of Palestinian resistance heroes who lived and died fighting against British and, later, Israeli colonialism and occupation, seeking liberation and self-determination.Political mind
To counter what Palestinians view as an honourable martyrdom – dying while fighting on the battlefield – several dubious accounts quickly emerged attempting to dishonour Sinwar and his life.
Indeed, this treatment of Palestinian leaders is typical of western outlets, which often recycle Israeli narratives about Palestinian leaders.
In an upcoming update of my book, Hamas: A Beginner’s Guide, I include various quotes from Sinwar, translated from Arabic speeches into English, that reveal a stark contrast between the man himself and the portrayal pushed by Israeli and western media.
One key moment that largely escaped the attention of even those who closely study Hamas was a press conference Sinwar held on 26 May 2021, a few days after the 11-day “Sword of Jerusalem” confrontation with Israel that erupted on 10 May.
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‘Free, free Palestine‘
Sinwar began by greeting Palestinians, Arabs and international solidarity protesters for their support for Palestine.
He first addressed the Palestinian citizens of Israel: “Greetings to you, great women and men in our land occupied in 1948, as you cling to your Palestinian, Islamic and Christian identity and would not become part of this alien entity [Israel].”
After thanking the Arabs who took to the streets in support of Palestine and the residents of the Sheikh Jarrah neighbourhood in occupied East Jerusalem, he turned his attention to international supporters: “Greetings to the free people of the world from all countries, races and nations who came out chanting ‘Free, free Palestine’ and denounced the crimes of the occupation against our children, women and civilians.”