The United States classifies Hamas as a terrorist organization. So does the European Union.

And, of course, so does Israel, which has borne the brunt of Hamas terrorism – whether via deadly suicide-bomber attacks or thousands of rockets aimed from Gaza at Israeli civilian targets.

But, lo and behold, don’t add the Washington Post to this august list of accurate identifiers of Hamas.. As far as the Post is concerned, Hamas has redeeming, exculpatory qualities which shield it from being classified as a terrorist outfit.

Or, as the Post puts it: “The Iranian-backed Hamas does not recognize Israel as a legitimate country,” and then adds that “Israel accuses the group of harboring extremists who carry out attacks on Israel from inside the Gaza Strip, a territory that Hamas rules.”  (“Israel suspends peace talks over Palestinian groups’ unity deal” April 25, by Anne Gearan and Ruth Eglash, page A12.)

Thus, the only beef the Post has with Hamas is that it doesn’t recognize Israel as a legitimate country. Otherwise, it’s supposedly OK. As for all the thousands of Gaza-launched rockets against civilian targets, that’s not the work of Hamas. That’s just Hamas sheltering some other “extremists”. And besides, that’s just an Israeli accusation, not necessarily a view espoused by the Washington Post.

Far be it, thus, for the Post to acknowledge that Hamas is a far more dangerous outfit that qualifies as engaged in terrorism, pure and simple. It certainly meets the basic definition of terrorism – deliberate use of violence against civilians in pursuit of a political or ideological agenda. That’s the real Hamas, which in its constitution and actions calls for annihilating Jews and the Jewish state.

To find this proper definition of Hamas, however, readers have to wait until the very last paragraph of the Gearan-Eglash dispatch, which carries a comment by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, as follows: “Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas has formed an alliance with a murderous terrorist organization that calls consistently for Israel’s destruction. Instead of choosing peace, he has formed an alliance with an organization whose charter calls on Muslims to fight and kill Jews.”

But that clarification appears only in the 27th paragraph of a 27-paragraph article.  How many readers do you think even get that far in their perusal of the Gearan-Eglash report?  

Yet, sad to say, their impressions already are formed by the previous misleading 26 paragraphs.

And that’s how Hamas gets a Kosher seal from the Post.

Leo Rennert is a former White House correspondent and Washington bureau chief of McClatchy Newspapers