As the US was justified in killing Osama bin Laden in Pakistan, Israel is justified in liquidating Hamas leaders wherever they reside.
By Neville Berman
September 11, 2001 was a day that shocked the world. On that day 19 Islamic terrorists hijacked 4 commercial airlines and used them to attack America. 2,977 people were killed and thousands more were injured.
That evening, President George W Bush was informed by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) that they had identified an Islamic organization known as al-Qaeda, led by Osama bin Laden, operating out of Afghanistan, as being responsible for the attacks. After the Taliban, who governed Afghanistan, rejected American demands to expel al-Qaeda and extradite its leaders, America ordered an attack on Afghanistan.
Osama bin Laden went into hiding and evaded capture. America offered a $25 million reward to anyone supplying information that would lead to the capture of bin Laden. False information poured in.
For years bin Laden managed to send tapes with recordings of his speeches from his hiding place, to the Al Jazeera TV station in Qatar. The tapes were then broadcast to the 430 million households that watch Al Jazeera broadcasts around the world. Most of the speeches promoted the Islamic concept of Jihad against the West. Bin Laden was determined to bring down the West. The Palestinians were of no interest to him and he never mentioned them.
For years the relentless search to locate bin Laden continued. Tens of thousands of cell phone calls were recorded and analysed. Electronic messages and aerial photography from satellite imagery were studied. After over 9 years of searching, the CIA finally believed that they had traced the courier that was delivering the tapes to Al Jazeera from a house in Pakistan. The evidence was not 100% conclusive that Osama bin Laden was actually living in the house, but was persuasive enough for President Obama to authorize an attack on the site. On May 11, 2011, Operation Neptune Spear was put into action. A team of navy seals were flown by Black Hawk helicopters into Pakistan. They managed to enter the compound, locate and kill Osama bin Laden and several of his aides and family. They also retrieved a trove of electronic discs and files that shed light on al Qaeda. Bin Laden’s body was brought back for positive identification and burial at sea. The killing of bin Laden was seen as a turning point in the fight against terror.
In 2005, Israel unilaterally demolished all Israeli settlements in Gaza, and withdrew entirely from the area. They then handed control of the territory to the Palestinian Authority (PA) led by Yasser Arafat. Two years later, Hamas violently took control of Gaza by killing the leadership of the PA in Gaza. Hamas is a militant Islamic organization that is an offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood that aims at a world living under Sharia law. Hamas does not hide their intentions. The Hamas Charter calls for the killing of all Jews and the elimination of Israel and the establishment of a Palestinian State from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea.
From the moment Hamas took control of Gaza they promoted hatred as a way to radicalize the population. Under the guise of a liberation movement, Hamas infiltrated every aspect of the lives of two million people living in Gaza. They infiltrated the United Nations Relief Works Agency (UNRWA) for Palestinian refugees. They radicalized the curriculum of all UNRWA schools in Gaza and promoted suicide bombing, jihad and martyrdom. They robbed banks in Gaza. They stole thousands of tons of humanitarian food aid and sold it to the people in Gaza at inflated prices. They collected taxes on all goods imported into Gaza. They set up monopolies that controlled cell phone services, petrol and gas supplies, and all other essential services. They built an army of radicalized terrorists, whose intention was nothing less than retaining absolute control of Gaza through force, and aimed at eliminating the State of Israel. They built hundreds of kilometres of tunnels under hospitals, mosques, schools and houses in order to hide missiles and military equipment and to be used to attack Israel. They built their headquarters in tunnels directly below hospitals. They used civilians as human shields to protect themselves from Israeli retaliation. They killed or maimed anyone who opposed them. They fired over 27,000 rockets into Israel. All of them were aimed at civilian targets. They broke every accepted norm of civilized behaviour, and ruled themselves out as ever being a peace partner. They brought death and destruction to the people of Gaza.
To the outside world they presented themselves as victims of Israeli occupation. Fake news about an Israel siege on Gaza, and Israel committing crimes against humanity, became their passport to an outpouring of humanitarian aid, especially from the gullible liberal west. Official figures published by the UN show the countries that financed UNRWA in 2023. The European Union and Britain were the largest contributors with 53%, followed by America and Canada with 38%. Japan and Australia contributed 5% and Muslim countries contributed 4%. Saudi Arabia donated $17 million out of the $1.2 billion UNRWA budget. It is clear that the West has an agenda to ensure that the Palestinians remain a threat to Israel, while the wealthy oil exporting Arab countries pay lip service to supporting Hamas. They see Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood as a direct threat to their way of life and rule.
Eight of the top leaders of Hamas, left the squalor that they had created in Gaza, and went to live with their families in Doha, Qatar. They arrived with billions of dollars that they had embezzled and stolen from the people of Gaza. They do not care at all about the poverty and destitute lives of the people in Gaza. On the contrary, the catastrophic pictures of poverty in Gaza are their passport for more humanitarian assistance to flow in. The more aid that flows in, the richer they become.
On the morning of October 7, 2023, Hamas attacked Israel. They attacked a music festival and nearby kibbutzim. They proudly filmed themselves committing barbaric crimes and openly boasting about killing, raping women of all ages, mutilating bodies, burning babies, and destroying whatever they could. They killed over 1,200 people and took over 250 hostages to Gaza. In deference to the families of those killed and taken hostage, the films taken by the terrorists have not been widely distributed by Israel. They are simply too shocking to be shown.
Immediately after the attack on October 7, Israel set itself the goal of returning every hostage and eliminating Hamas. Now you cannot eliminate an ideology, but you can reduce the capacity of your enemies to be able to carry out their destructive aims. One of the ways of doing this is to eliminate their leaders. In July 2024, Ismail Haniyeh the overall political leader of Hamas who had been living in Qatar was assassinated while visiting Iran. The level of Israeli intelligence required to succeed in assassinating Haniyah in a pin point manner while in an apartment in Tehran, shocked Iran. On October 16, 2024, more than a year after Hamas attacked Israel, Yahya Sinwar the leader of Hamas in Gaza was killed. He was succeeded by his brother Mohammed Sinwar who was in turn eliminated on May 13, 2025. Both were killed in Gaza.
On September 9, 2025 Israel decided to attack the 7 remaining leaders of Hamas who were living in Qatar. These leaders are terrorists in every sense of the word. They helped plan the attacks on Israel and they radicalized the people in Gaza. The attack did not go according to plan. Instead of killing the leaders of Hamas, 5 lower-level members of Hamas and one member of the Qatari security force were killed by mistake. None of the billionaire leaders of Hamas living in Doha were killed.
Now comes the double standards of the world towards Israel. When America killed Osama bin Laden in Pakistan, no one accused America of attacking Pakistan. When Israel attacked the leadership of Hamas in Qatar, the whole world accused Israel of attacking Qatar. Israel did not attack Qatar. It attacked Hamas leaders living in Qatar. There is a huge difference. The double standard is obvious.
To add insult to injury, on September 25, 2025, the Prime Minister of Israel. Bibi Netanyahu, while attending a meeting with President Trump in the oval office, was ordered to personally apologise to the Prime Minister of Qatar in an arranged phone call. He was also ordered to promise that Israel would never attack Qatar in the future. It was a deliberate humiliation of Israel’s elected prime minister. In trying to mollify Qatar, Trump sent the wrong message to the world. America should not be approving sanctuary for terrorist leaders in any country, especially not Qatar. Qatar is using its bountiful financial resources to advance a very serious double game of promoting chaos across America, while pretending to be an ally of America.
No matter how great a friend President Trump has been to Israel, it seems reasonable to assume that in the same way that America attacked the leaders of al-Qaeda in Pakistan, Israel has the right to attack the leaders of Hamas in Qatar. What happened in the oval office does not augur well for the future of the American Israeli relationship.
About the writer:
Accountant Neville Berman had an illustrious sporting career in South Africa, being twice awarded the South African State Presidents Award for Sport and was a three times winner of the South African Maccabi Sportsman of the Year Award. In 1978 he immigrated to the USA to coach the United States men’s field hockey team, whereafter, in 1981 he immigrated to Israel where he practiced as an accountant and then for 20 years was the Admin Manager at the American International School in Even Yehuda, Israel. He is married with two children and one granddaughter.
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