The Palestinian resistance movement Hamas has extolled as “historic” its latest retaliatory operation against the Israeli regime in the occupied territories and vowed that the attacks on the illegal entity will continue until the full liberation of Palestine.
Khaled al-Qaddoumi, the Hamas representative in Iran, made the statement in an interview with Press TV on Sunday.
“What has happened today is a historic moment which has been achieved by the Palestinian soldiers and Palestinian people in the confrontation of the last 74 years against the Israeli occupation,” Qaddoumi said. “Our people have waited a long time that the international community could serve any of their own legitimate rights and return any of those legitimate rights to them.”
Stressing that there is a rightist fanatic regime headed by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the occupied territories, Qaddoumi said Hamas had sent many messages to the international community to expose the regime’s explicit crimes and torture against Palestinian people but there were no response.
“Palestinians launched Operation Al-Aqsa Storm to tell the international community that al-Aqsa and al-Quds mean Palestine and this operation has started for the liberation of Palestine; all Palestine from the river to the sea,” the Hamas official said, referring to a call for a Palestinian state extending from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea, the territory controlled by the Israeli regime.
The international community, Qaddoumi said, has left Palestine and Palestinians alone. “Our only option and our fate is to fight the Israeli regime. Today, we have started the battle of liberation of Palestine, all Palestine, and no body is able to stop it.”
On Saturday, Hamas launched its large-scale operation with a heavy barrage of rockets in response to Israel’s desecration of the Al-Aqsa Mosque and increased settler violence.
More than 650 Israeli settlers and troops have died as a result of the large-scale operation and over 2,000 others have been injured.
Israeli media outlets have reported an approximate 750 Israeli soldiers and settlers missing so far.
Hospital officials in the Gaza Strip have recorded the death of more than 370 Palestinians and the injury of roughly 2,200 others. A large number of buildings, homes, and public facilities have also been badly damaged due to heavy Israeli bombardments.
The retaliatory operation by Hamas is the largest after the 11-day Israeli war against Gaza in May 2021, which took place after weeks of violence against Palestinians in al-Quds and a brutal crackdown on worshipers at the al-Aqsa Mosque, as well as attempts to steal their land in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood. At least 260 Palestinians, including over 60 children, were killed during the offensive as resistance fighters retaliated. The regime was eventually forced to announce a ceasefire brokered by Egypt.
