The London School of Economics’ decision to host the launch this week of Understanding Hamas and Why That Matters – a book that attempts to sanitise and fails to properly condemn a terrorist organisation responsible for the worst massacre of Jews since the Holocaust – has rightly sparked outrage. It is a shameless attempt to rehabilitate a group that revels in the slaughter of civilians, delights in hostage-taking, and has openly vowed to repeat its crimes.
If there were any doubts about Hamas’ true nature, they should have been put to rest on 7 October
But while the LSE controversy is unsettling, it is merely a symptom of a much larger problem: the enduring failure of many in the West to grasp the true nature of Hamas. It is not, as some insist, a mere ‘resistance movement’ born out of Israeli policies. Nor is it simply a nationalist organisation with an Islamic flavour.
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