One of the things about whackadoodle conspiracy theories is that the people embracing them use imaginary dots to connect invisible lines. For them, the absence of any evidence whatsoever is proof that their theories are real. However, those of us saying that Hamas routinely uses civilians, especially children, as shields to raise the body count for propaganda purposes don’t need invisible and imaginary proof. Instead, Hamas’s leaders are boasting about the civilians they put in harm’s way and reveling in their deaths.

Israel begged Gaza’s citizens for two weeks to leave Gaza before it began its bombardment. Instead, we got news that Hamas fighters were preventing people from leaving and that they are denying resources to those who stayed (voluntarily or not). That’s because, to Hamas, every person living in Gaza is a soldier in the jihad against Israel and the West. Some serve by fighting; others serve simply by dying.

And again, we don’t have to assume that. Hamas is telling us that. Having trapped civilians in Gaza, Hamas’s leader, Ismail Haniyeh (living safely in Qatar), is boasting about the wonders of their dying for the cause:

I have said this before, and I say it time again: The blood of the women, children, and elderly… I am not saying that this blood is calling for your [help]. We are the ones who need this blood, so it awakens within us the revolutionary spirit, so it awakens within us resolve, so it awakens within us the spirit of challenge, and [pushes us] to move forward.

This is the same mindset that sees Hamas build its headquarters underneath the biggest hospital in Gaza:

They turn hospitals into headquarters for their terror.

The Shifa Hospital, one of Gaza’s biggest medical centers, is being used as a terror operations base by Hamas terrorists.

This is an illustrative video which points out the different locations in and under the hospital… pic.twitter.com/SdyZwgGMU7

— Israel Foreign Ministry (@IsraelMFA) October 27, 2023

Nor is this a guess on Israel’s part. Back in 2014, even the Washington Post acknowledged that Hamas was using hospitals, mosques, and schools as its armories.

Israel is faced with the choice to leave Hamas’s massive underground infrastructure intact or to bomb a hospital. The fact that the war crime is Hamas’s, for using civilians as shields, is irrelevant. For the world, it will be enough that there is civilian blood and that Israel’s bombs were the last link in the chain that killed them.

Within the Arab world, Hamas’s disregard for its citizens is well-known, of course. Egyptian journalist Ibraham Eissa spells it out for his Arab-speaking audience as he discusses what Hamas has done during the 16 years since Israel withdrew from Gaza and the citizens elected Hamas to lead them:

For 16 years, Hamas has been ruling the Gaza Strip with an iron fist, but has not dug and built any bomb shelters for the Palestinian civilians. The 3,000 people killed [in Gaza] – 64% of whom were women and children – could have been safe in bomb shelters now. Hamas dug tunnels and built an underground city, for its weapons, ammunitions, and its means of killing and destruction, but did not build bomb shelters for the living. Why? Because life is cheap to them. [snip] This is a group that does not take into any consideration whatsoever the lives of people or the future of the Palestinians and their cause.

Israel is a nation that is committed to life. It tries desperately hard not to kill civilians but to confine its war to Hamas combatants. However, when you’re going up against a death cult that sees blood as a welcome sacrifice to its gods, you have a choice: The death cult drinks up your blood or its own. Viewed that way, there’s no choice at all.

Image: Ismail Haniyeh. MEMRI screen grab.