Amira Hass A Rational Hamas
Israel is incomparably stronger than Hamas – but it will never win: Interview with Hamas leader in Gaza
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The interview with Yahya Sinwar,
Hamas chief in Gaza, which was conducted by Italian journalist
Francesca Borri and published in the Israeli daily Yedioth Ahronoth,”
set off a major internet storm in the Gaza Strip and the Palestinian
diaspora. What? Sinwar spoke knowingly to an Israeli newspaper? It
wasn’t the content that caused the uproar (“A new war is not in anyone’s
interest, certainly not our interest”) – only the host.
Sinwar’s bureau
hastened to publish a clarification: The request was for an interview
with an Italian newspaper and a British newspaper; the Western media
department in the Hamas movement ascertained that the journalist was
neither Jewish nor Israeli, and that she has never worked with the
Israeli press. There was no face-to-face interview with the
above-mentioned journalist, but rather a written response to her
questions. The journalist met with Sinwar only for the purpose of a
joint photo.
Borri, 38, is a
freelance journalist who began writing only about six years ago, mainly
from Syria. “I think that Sinwar agreed to let me interview him because
he knew that I’m a war correspondent and that I would understand when he
told me that he isn’t interested in another war,” she told me over the
phone from Italy on Friday.
Her articles have
been published in many languages – including in Hebrew in Yedioth
Ahronoth. In June, Borri visited Gaza and published an article that was
“tough on Hamas,” as she put it. She was haunted by the sight of little
children begging, and in her opinion the Islamic resistance movement is
also responsible for the terrible deterioration in the Strip. That
article was also translated and published in Yedioth.
And then Borri
received a text message from one of Sinwar’s advisers, she told me. Why
are you so hard on the Palestinians, he complained. They exchanged
several text messages, until she asked if she could interview Sinwar. In
late August she came to the Gaza Strip again, to interview him.
I asked her whether
Hamas really didn’t know that the article would be published in Yedioth.
“As a freelancer, transparency is important to me,” she said. “It was
clear to everyone that the interview would be translated into other
languages, including Hebrew. Everyone in Sinwar’s bureau knew that my
articles have been published in Yedioth Ahronoth.”
What
caused the outrage was that the wording of the article seemed to
indicate that Borri was sent by the Israeli newspaper, and that that’s
how the situation was presented to Sinwar. Here is the wording of her
first question: “This is the first time ever that you’re agreeing to
speak to the Western media – and to an Israeli newspaper yet.” According
to Borri, the words “and to an Israeli newspaper yet” didn’t appear in
her original question to Sinwar.
>> 'We can’t prevail against a nuclear power': Hamas' Gaza chief says he doesn't want war with Israel
On the other hand,
she confirmed that Sinwar’s final remark in the article, “and they
translate you regularly into Hebrew too,” really was said. “Sinwar spoke
to me, and through me to the world. I had the impression that he’s
interested in talking through me to the Israelis too,” she said.
And
was the interview really conducted face-to-face and during joint trips
with Sinwar and his aides over the course of five days, or in writing,
as Hamas claimed. Borri explains: “I never record. I feel that people’s
answers change when they see a recording device.” She didn’t travel with
him in his car, but she says she did join a convoy of cars with Sinwar
through the Strip, yet preferred not to say where.
On
Thursday, in other words before the publication of the full article in
Yedioth on Friday, the Al Jazeera website in Arabic already published
the text of the written questions and answers that were exchanged,
according to Hamas, between Sinwar’s bureau and Borri. A comparison of
the written version with the article in Yedioth reveals great similarity
between the two texts, with a few differences – mainly a change in the
order of the questions and their answers, sentences, declarations and
facts that were deleted from the Hebrew version, and a few sentences
that were added to it.
The questions and answers
in the Arabic version flow, and there is a connection between the
replies and the following questions; in other words, a conversation is
taking place. According to Al Jazeera, the written questions and replies
were exchanged several times between the parties. There is even mention
of how during the interview, Sinwar pointed to one of his advisers and
said that his son was killed by Israeli fire.
Borri
confirmed in a conversation with me that she combined the replies
received in writing, over a period of time, with answers she received
orally. Due to the great similarity between the two versions, my
impression is that many replies were sent to her in writing. A Gaza
resident told me that he was convinced that most of the answers were
given in writing because of “the polished wording, the level-headed
replies and the rational explanations.”
He
believes that an entire team thought things through and wrote the
answers, not Sinwar alone. He also said that the message in the
interview is addressed to the Palestinians in Gaza “who are sick and
tired of Hamas rule,” no less than to readers in the West, whom Borri
enables to see a senior Hamas official as a leader who cares about his
people, rather than as a caricature of a bloodthirsty fanatic.
And I was left
longing for the period when senior Hamas officials gave interviews to
the Israeli press and to a Jewish Israeli like me – including Sheikh
Ahmed Yassin, Ismail Haniyeh and many others. And I was left with the
following conclusion: When Israel doesn’t allow Israeli journalists to
enter Gaza, it makes life easy for Hamas.
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