Hamas Terror Chief Hails ‘Enormous Support’ From West

Hamas terror chief Ismail Haniyeh has praised the “enormous support” for the Palestinian cause amid ongoing pro-Palestinian protests in European capitals in which Israel has been compared to Nazi Germany.

In a speech which aired hours after Hamas and Israel agreed to a ceasefire Friday following an 11-day conflict, Haniyeh praised the “enormous support in the West and Europe.”

As Israel was being pummeled by more than 4,000 rockets launched from the Hamas-ruled Gaza over the past two weeks, hundreds of thousands took to the streets in dozens of cities all over the world to protest the Israel Defense Force’s (IDF) retaliatory strikes on terror targets in the Strip.

Over the weekend, fresh rallies across the U.S. took place, including in New York, Houston, Philadelphia, Chicago and Portland.

180,000 people attended a demonstration in London on Saturday, in which protesters likened Israel to Nazi Germany, claimed it had perpetrated a “Holocaust” against the Palestinians, and burned Israeli flags.

Placards had anti-Semitic slogans including, “Nazis are still around, they call themselves Zionists now” and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu “surpasses Hitler in barbarism.” A week earlier, pro-Palestinian supporters in a convoy of cars were heard screaming, “F*** the Jews, f*** their mothers, rape their daughters.”

Thousands more also protested in several French cities, including the capital Paris.

In his speech, Haniyeh thanked Iran or providing funds and weapons to his Gaza-ruling terror group.

“I cannot but thank [Iran] who brought forth money and weaponry to the valiant resistance,” Haniyeh said, according to an English translation of his remarks by Press TV.

Haniyeh, who was speaking from Qatar, where he currently resides, also addressed the deadly clashes in Israel’s mixed Arab-Jewish cities as well as the Jewish state’s four recent normalization agreements with Arab nations.

“This battle has destroyed the project of ‘coexistence’ with the Israeli occupation, of the project ‘normalization’ with Israel,” he said.

We saw our Arab and Islamic nation arose, from east to west, in all its components and factions, behind Jerusalem and Palestine and the resistance,” Haniyeh said.

The recent conflict, Haniyeh declared,  “defeated the illusions of negotiations, defeated the deal of the century,” in reference to the Trump administration’s peace plan for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

It also “defeated the projects of normalizing (relations) with the Zionist occupation,” referring to the Trump-brokered normalization deals between four Arab countries and Israel.

“Resistance is the best strategic choice for liberation and return,” Haniyeh said.

He called the outcome of the conflict a “divine victory.”

Haniyeh also said that Hamas would stop at nothing until Jerusalem was “liberated”.

“Jerusalem is the axis of the struggle,” Haniyeh said, adding “Gaza rose up so as to defend Jerusalem.”

“Gaza bore the sword of Jerusalem with merit and dignity, and taught the enemy a lesson he shall not forget,” Haniyeh continued.

More than 4,000 rockets were launched at Israel from the Hamas-ruling Gaza Strip over a period of eleven days. The Israel Defense Forces carried out massive retaliatory strikes against terror targets in the coastal enclave. According to the Hamas-run Gaza health ministry, more than 230 Palestinians been killed, 59 of them children.

Israel says more than 150 of those killed were terrorists from Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad terror groups. Many, including children, were also killed by errant Hamas rockets. At least 450 rockets were misfired and landed within Gaza itself.