In a shocking development from Malappuram in Kerala, Khaled Mashal, the former chief of the terrorist organisation Hamas, virtually addressed a ‘solidarity event’ organised by the Solidarity Youth Movement at 4:30 pm on 27 October. The group is the youth wing of the extremist Jamaat-e-Islami Hind outfit. The terrorist leader reportedly called for the annihilation of Hinduism and Zionism in his address.
In his speech, Khalid asked people present at the rally to extend unconditional support to Hamas and made anti-Hindu comments. Anti-Hindu slogans were raised in the rally held in Malappuram, and the audience is heard applauding the address of Khaled Mashal playing on a large screen. They supported his call and vowed to support Hamas terrorists.
Khaled Mashal’s video address was around 7 minutes long, during which slogans like ‘Buldoze Hindutva’ and ‘unroot Zionism’ were chanted by the audience. It is not confirmed whether the video address was live or it was a recorded one.
Kerala Bharatiya Janata Party President K Surendran took to social media to condemn the incident and termed it “alarming.” He questioned Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan, the state’s police force and their inaction. The leader added, “Under the guise of ‘Save Palestine,’ they’re glorifying Hamas, a terrorist organisation and its leaders as ‘warriors.’ This is unacceptable!” He also tagged the Office of the Home Minister in his comment and sought its intervention and investigation into the matter.
Hamas leader Khaled Mashel's virtual address at the Solidarity event in Malappuram is alarming. Where's @pinarayivijayan's Kerala Police ? Under the guise of 'Save Palestine,' they're glorifying Hamas, a terrorist organization, and its leaders as 'warriors.' This is… pic.twitter.com/51tWi88wTb
— K Surendran (@surendranbjp) October 27, 2023
Who is Khaled Mashal
Khaled Mashal is a leader and former head of the Palestinian terrorist outfit Hamas. He rose to prominence as the head of Hamas’s branch in Kuwait following the group’s formation in 1987. He became the leader of its politburo in 1992 and one of its founding members. He was acknowledged as the head of Hamas following Israel’s assassination of Sheikh Ahmed Yassin and his replacement, Abdel Aziz al-Rantisi in the spring of 2004.
Hamas stunned the world by winning a majority of the seats in the Palestinian legislative election in 2006 under his leadership. He, however, stepped down as the politburo chairman at the end of his term limit in 2017. Khaled Mashal’s family was forced to leave the West Bank after the 1967 Six-Day War and he has since lived in exile in various Arab countries. He was regarded as a member of Hamas’ “external leadership” as a result.
Anti-Israel rally in Kozhikode
Congress Working Committee (CWC) member and Lok Sabha Thiruvananthapuram MP Shashi Tharoor was criticised by the BJP in Kerala on 27 October for attending the Indian Union Muslim League’s anti-Israel demonstration on 26 October and labelled it a “pro-Hamas” gathering. Tens of thousands of IUML supporters expressed their opposition to the Jewish state by taking to the streets of Kozhikode.
IUML members accompanied by hundreds of women chanted slogans like “Solidarity with Palestine,” “Down with Zionism,” and carried banners which read “Indians with Palestine” and “End the Genocide in Gaza,” among other things. The group’s state president Panakkad Syed Sadikali Shihab Thangal alleged that Israel is the world’s largest terrorist state and claimed that the Indian government was trying to whitewash the country. The rally justified horrors perpetrated by Hamas as “resistance.”
Shashi Tharoor who was invited as the chief guest referred to Hamas as terrorists and described the assault on Israel as a “terrorist act.” However, after receiving harsh criticism from leftists and Hamas supporters he withdrew his comments and accused his opponents of misrepresenting the message.
K Surendran voiced concern that the situation was being exploited to inflame communal tensions in the state. He charged that anti-national slogans had been raised throughout the programme. He asserted that the parliamentarian presence at the event was a ploy to win over communal factions and branded it treason to back Hamas which he contended supported forces hostile to India.
In addition, he accused the latter of attempting to take advantage of communal division in advance of the next general elections. He further accused senior IUML leader and former minister M K Munner who is presently serving as an MLA of equating Hamas terrorists with freedom fighters like Subhash Chandra Bose and Bhagat Singh.
Meanwhile, Israel has pledged to eliminate Hamas following the 7 October terror attack and minimise injury to Gaza’s civilian population and has stated that its campaign against the Iran-backed terror group is intended to destroy its infrastructure. The Israeli military also informed that its “ground forces are expanding” their operations in Gaza.
