Eurasia Press & News
After Hamas refused to release the remaining Israeli and foreign hostages, the IDF reentered Gaza on March 18, 2025. Unless the hostages abducted by Hamas and its allies are released and the Palestinian threat entities disarm and surrender, Israel will reoccupy and annex Gaza. In keeping with the plan of President Donald J. Trump and despite the protest by Arab governments, Gaza will be evacuated of the Palestinians. This will be the price of a devastating terrorist attack that Hamas and its allies mounted against Israel on October 7-8, 2023.
In both the classified and open source literature, the All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on UK-Israel has produced the most comprehensive report on the Hamas-led attack on Israel on October 7-8, 2025. The Report documents evidence of the massacre from multiple sources including the film footage from cameras carried by the terrorists themselves.
The Report presents incontrovertible proof of how 1,182 innocent people were indeed murdered by Hamas and its allies, and how it led to a devastating war that has changed and will change the Middle East. The attack also brought about unprecedented suffering of the Palestinian people and lost Israeli public support for a two-state solution. The Report describes the Hamas-led attack to the “scenes of sadistic barbarism not seen in world history since the Rape of Nanjing in 1937.” When Khalil Al-Hayya, the most senior leader of Hamas outside Gaza, was asked by Jeremy Bowen of the BBC in Doha, “Why did you kill so many civilians, women and children?”, he replied, “We ordered our resistance fighters on 7 October not to target civilians, women and children. The objective was the occupation soldiers who are always killing, bombing and destroying in Gaza. We don’t endorse harming civilians. On the ground, there were certainly personal mistakes and actions. The fighters may have felt their lives were in danger.”
The report also demonstrated the deceptive nature of Hamas, a group that has now lost its credibility to govern Gaza or should not play a political role in determining the future of the Palestinian people. If Muslim and Arab leaders are genuinely committed to restoring security and stability in the Middle East, they should urge Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) and other threat entities associated with the massacre of October 7, 2023 to disarm and surrender.
The Context
After Al Qaeda’s 9/11 attack, the world’s worst act of international terrorism was 10/7 staged by Hamas led Palestinian threat groups. The third worst act of international terrorism was Sri Lanka’s Easter Sunday massacre by the Islamic State. The rise of threat groups driven by religious ideologies such as Al Qaeda, Islamic State, Hamas and its allies threaten harmony within and between communities.
The presence of these threat groups has created instability in the Middle East. It has resulted in wars prompting foreign intervention most recently by the U.S. led coalition against Ansarullah in Yemen to restore stability in the Red Sea. Israel started operations against Hezbollah in Lebanon after it mounted attacks against Israel on October 8, 2023. In its north, 96,000 Israelis were displaced and in Lebanon, 1.4 million Lebanese were displaced. Iran sponsors Shiite and Sunni threat entities in the region. Iran, a theocratic state determined to develop a nuclear capability, will be the ultimate target of the US and Israel.
The Israeli operations in Lebanon severely weakened Hezbolah, an ally of Syria’s Bashar al Assad. The opportunity was exploited by a splinter of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), Hayat Tehrir Al Sham (HTS) to capture power in Syria. As HTS engages in the ethnic cleaning of Alawites and treat Christians, Druze and other minorities as second class citizens, HTS run Syria too will be a future threat to the region.
The consequence of 10/7 will be the Israeli annexation of Gaza. Unless Hamas and its allies release the hostages, disarm and surrender, Israel is moving in that direction.
Background
The Middle East has been a region of conflict largely due to the unresolved Palestinian conflict. For geopolitical reasons, governments use, misuse and abuse non state armed groups to advance their own interests. The Middle East host and even sponsor threat entities like Hezbollah, Ansarullah, Hamas, PIJ, Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigade and others that engage in political violence and terrorism.
The Hamas-led attack on October 7, 2023 was different in scale, size and magnitude. The attack included not only killing, maiming and injuring of civiiians but taking hostages, raping and burning. As such, the community of nations should unite to dismantle Hamas and its allies that participated in the October 7 attack. Otherwise, this practice will become a standard modus operandi for not only Islamist groups but other groups.
The Report on the October 7-8, 2023 attack should be read by anyone concerned about the future of the Middle East especially of the Palestinians and the Muslim World in general.
An excerpt from the report:
“Specifically asked by Bowen about sexual assault, Al-Hayya stated, “The orders and ethics of all Palestinians and the resistance fighters were humanitarian. We’re brought up according to the Islamic religion, culture and national civilisation. We protect them as we protect ourselves. Sexual, or non-sexual, assault has never been proven” When Bowen said that evidence of sexual assault was piling up, Al-Hayya said, “I told you the instructions were clear. There may have been abnormal acts by irresponsible people, but these are just allegations.”
By total contrast, our Report details that horrific acts of systematic rape and sexual abuse took place, in contradiction to Koranic teaching, and that everything Al-Hayya said was a lie, as he must have known it was. We have allowed no embellishment of the facts, which are painful and distressing enough as they are. We have gone out of our way not to include information that we suspect is true but cannot be double-checked. We have concentrated on the two days between the unleashing of the assault on the morning of 7 October 2023 and the liberation of the last of the Kibbutzim, and we have documented each of nearly 1,200 deaths so that future generations will not be misled about the extent and horror of the massacre.”
Recommendations
To prevent further loss of Palestinian lives and ultimately the Israeli annexation of Gaza, Muslim leaders especially the Arab leaders should take three steps.
First, urge Hamas, PIJ and the other threat entities to release the hostages. As long as they hold hostages, Israel has the right to intervene in Gaza.
Second, urge the Palestinians threat entities to disarm and surrender or face the devastating consequences of war.
Third, develop a zero-tolerance approach against Political Islam, an ideology that has ruined the Muslim World and continued to threaten humanity.
Like any community, most Muslims do not subscribe to violence especially terrorism, the killing, maiming, and injuring of civilians. However, Muslim governments especially theirs leaders have been reluctant to act decisively against Islamists unless and until they directly threatened them. Groups such as the Muslim Brotherhood that divide communities continues to operate in most Middle East countries. Although Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince and Prime Minister Mohomed bin Salman has crackdown on the Salafi Wahhabi groups, they continue to operate outside the Kingdom. The Muslim leaders have failed to take a common stand against the exploitation of their faith by threat entities to harm both mainstream Muslims and non Muslims.
Conclusion
If 9/11 did not change the world, 10/7 will change the Middle East, the heartland of the world. If there is no resolve on the part of the Muslim leaders especially the Arab World, exclusivism, extremism, violence and terrorism will continue to threaten the Middle East. Continuous war in the Levant will expand and ruin what is remaining of the stability and security of the Middle East.
One of the major failures of the fading world order was the lack of global leadership to establish peace in the Middle East. Although a two-state solution has been on the agenda, the western and eastern leaders lacked the resolve to build support to create a Palestinian state that will not harm Israel. To ensure long term peace and stability in the region, the world should establish a two-state solution for the Palestinian people. There was a grave failure on the part of the international community to spearhead such a far reaching initiative that will bring peace both to the Palestinians and the Israelis. The Jews, Israelis and Israel has distanced themselves away from the idea of a two-state solution after 10/7. However, the future stability and security of Israel itself rests in creating a secure and a peaceful Palestinian state that will coexist side by side with Israel.
To save Palestinian lives, Muslim leaders should urge Hamas and its allies to release the hostages, disarm and surrender. The leaders should not be driven by the Arab or the Muslim street but by what is right. Hamas is still holding 59 hostages, 24 of who are still alive.
No right thinking government or citizen should permit taking or holding hostages.
Muslim leadership in the early 21st century is challenged. The wise leaders should take a risk and make it their highest priority to restore relations with Israel and work with the Israeli leaders to create a two-state solution. The failure to do so will be not only the colossal loss of lives both Palestinians and Israelis, but the annexation of Gaza by Israel and continuing war in the Middle East.
