Bardawil: The west made a mistake by not dealing with Hamas

[P F Tinmore]

GAZA, (PIC)-- Senior Hamas official Salah Al-Bardawil stated Saturday that the European demands for ending Gaza siege is recognition that the blockade is unjust and illegal.

Bardawil added in a press release that the European calls for opening dialog with Hamas indicate that Europe started to realize how wrong its policies were and in harmony with the USA policies.

Bardawil: The west made a mistake by not dealing with Hamas

 

[P F Tinmore]

Dr. Salah Al Bardawil: Hamas’ Voice to Europe

ONE OF THE first things 47-year-old Dr. Salah Al Bardawil, professor of Arabic language and literature and newly elected Hamas member of the Palestinian Legislative Council, is eager to show a new acquaintance are documents from the British Ministry of Foreign Affairs. He spreads the papers wide, his glasses reflecting the text. The documents prove his father’s ownership of 124 dunums of fertile farmland, including olive and orange groves, palm trees and the family’s two-story house, close to the shores of Ashdod beach in what is now Israel.

After the massive ethnic cleansing of 1948, Dr. Al Bardawil’s parents never saw their land or home again. Al Bardawil was born 11 years later, in southern Gaza’s Khan Younis refugee camp. Like most refugee children, he went to UNRWA schools. He was able to travel to Cairo for university, however, eventually earning a Ph.D. in Arabic literature, with a specialty in Palestinian literature. He has been a teacher for 21 years, 16 of them as a professor at Islamic University in Gaza City. He and his wife have seven children, and still live in Khan Younis refugee camp.

Now Dr. Al Bardawil, who joined the PLO in 1999, has been named Hamas spokesman of the newly elected Palestinian parliament. If we are to believe Western and Israeli media, this soft-spoken scholar is a terrorist, quick to send young fanatics on bombing missions. EU governments were quick to adopt the “terrorist” label—some knowing that to do otherwise would bring heavy pressure from the U.S. and Israel, others simply preferring to accept the U.S./Israeli labels slapped on Hamas. However, a number of less narrow-minded European NGOs—from such countries as Norway, Denmark, Sweden, Italy, Spain, Germany and France—have invited Dr. Al Bardawil to visit them, explain Hamas’ vision and policies, and allow listeners to make their own judgments.

Dr. Salah Al Bardawil: Hamas’ Voice to Europe