Alan Johnston and Hamas

A major defeat in the war to defend the free world

Melanie Phillips

4 August 2007

Shortly after the release of Alan Johnston from Gaza the website of Conflicts Forum, a group advocating engagement with Islamists and which is run by the former MI6 officer Alastair Crooke, posted a fascinating transcript.

A Hamas spokesman, Ayman Taha, has acknowledged its past co-operation with the Army of Islam, but claims that ended after Shalit’s kidnapping. There are certainly tensions between them — Dagmoush himself has claimed that Hamas failed to deliver on its promises to him.

But since Johnston was so close to Hamas it is naive to think that Dagmoush would have kidnapped him without receiving at least tacit approval from his powerful patron. And although Hamas said immediately it knew who was holding him, it did nothing for many weeks — although its closeness to the Army of Islam enabled it to stop them killing him.

It was Hamas which had everything to gain from the ordeal of Alan Johnston, its friend whom the BBC was about to transfer out of Gaza anyway — and its strategy has worked brilliantly. Not only did it open communication with Britain, but the idea of negotiating with Hamas is now gaining traction fast on both sides of the Atlantic.

This agenda is being pushed by organisations such as Conflicts Forum, whose director Alastair Crooke is now a constant media presence. Material posted on the Conflicts Forum website — whose slogan is ‘Listening to Political Islam, Recognising Resistance’ — openly promotes Hamas itself. Thus in June it claimed of the Gaza coup: ‘This is not an Islamic revolution but simply a political party attempting to defend itself against the militia of an unelected warlord backed by foreign powers. Not only is life returning to normal, people are now breathing much easier.’

No mention of the inhuman savagery of Hamas, the way it bound the hands and feet of its opponents and hurled them off the top of tall buildings.