Former Hamas Chief Asks Muslims Around the World To Take To the Streets Friday To Join War Against Israel

A founding Hamas member and currently the leader of the terror organization in Qatar, Khaled Meshal, is calling on Muslims around the world, particularly those in countries surrounding Israel, to join the group’s struggle against “the Jews” by taking to the streets Friday and sacrificing their own lives if necessary to regain control of Jerusalem.“[We must] head to the squares and streets of the Arab and Islamic world on Friday,” Mr. Meshal said in a recorded statement sent to Reuters and other press outlets in the Muslim world. “Tribes of Jordan, sons of Jordan, brothers and sisters of Jordan … This is a moment of truth and the borders are close to you, you all know your responsibility.”He said Friday would mark the “Friday of Al-Aqsa flood,” a reference to the mosque in Jerusalem and the name attached to last weekend’s massacre of Israeli civilians by terrorists from the Palestinian enclave of Gaza. He called on Muslims in the countries surrounding Israel to march to the border and attempt to infiltrate the country and those elsewhere to take to the streets in a “Jihad” against Israel and its international supporters.While the incendiary language is hardly new for Mr. Meshal, the call to arms could find more receptive audiences given the events of last weekend and the world’s reaction. Muslims sympathetic to the Palestinian cause and their allies have marched in several Western cities in recent days — often spouting virulently antisemitic slogans — to protest Israel’s response to the atrocities and its campaign to rid Gaza of the Hamas terrorists.In his speech, Mr. Meshal asked for financial help from Muslims across the globe, asking them to embark on what he called a “financial Jihad” to reward the families of the terrorists who carried out last weekend’s attacks and compensate Palestinians in Gaza for the destruction caused by the war.“This is the time for Jihad to be applied on the ground rather than just in theory,” he said. “Funds are important but today we are asking for your blood and souls [to be sacrificed for Palestine].”“This is the hour of testing,” he said. “This is the day and the moment we talked about all the time: The Zionists played with fire when they hit the Al-Aqsa Mosque. And I call on everyone at this time to take responsibility and do everything in their power for this war.”Mr. Meshal became chief of Hamas in 1992 and survived an assassination attempt several years later by Mossad agents in Jordan. He stepped down as the group’s leader in 2012 and now is nominally in charge of its diaspora office in Doha.__________War against Israel is what the former leader of Hamas was calling on Muslims to join. The point was misstated in the bulldog edition.

Former Hamas Chief Asks Muslims Around the World To Take To the Streets Friday To Join War Against Israel

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