Reuters is reporting that Hamas has welcomed a decision by the International Criminal Court (ICC) to open a war crimes inquiry regarding the conflict in Gaza. According to the report, the group said it was willing to supply documents alleging Israeli war crimes in the conflict:
January 17, 2014 (Reuters) – The Palestinian Islamist group Hamas said on Saturday it welcomed a decision by the International Criminal Court to launch an inquiry into possible war crimes in the Palestinian territories.
ICC prosecutors said on Friday the preliminary examination would scrutinize ‘in full independence and impartiality’ crimes that may have occurred since June 13 last year, opening a path to possible charges against Israelis or Palestinians.
The court’s decision came after Western-backed Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, a rival to Hamas, requested ICC membership, against strong opposition from Israel and the United States.
Fawzi Barhoum, a spokesman for Hamas which rules the Gaza Strip, said on Saturday the Islamist group appreciated the move.
‘What is needed now is to quickly take practical steps in this direction and we are ready to provide (the court) with thousands of reports and documents that confirm the Zionist enemy has committed horrible crimes against Gaza and against our people,’ he said in a statement.”
Read the rest here.
In December 2014, the GMBDW reported that Hamas had won a court ruling that could conceivably lead to it being removed from the EU list of terrorist organizations. The GMBDW posted a Featured Story earlier this week identifying a French Hamas lawyer and other Global Muslim Brotherhood leaders/entities as playing a key role in the court case. The GMBDW wonders if those same individuals will be the ones supplying the documents mentioned in the above report.
The GMBDW also reported yesterday that Hamas leaders had praised this week’s stabbing attack on a Jerusalem bus as “heroic and brave” and noted that the group had posted an instructional video on stabbing three weeks before the attack.
The Hamas charter says that it is “one of the wings of the Muslim Brothers in Palestine.”
For a profile of Hamas, go here.