2 September 2000

In the name of Allah the most Gracious the most Merciful    

Trial of Mujahid Mahmoud Abu Hannoud
Shameful spot in records of the Palestinian Authority

In a flagrant challenge to feelings of our Palestinian people and feelings of our Arab and Islamic Nation, the Palestinian Authority at a late hour yesterday, Friday night 1/9/2000, staged a summary trial of the Mujahid Mahmoud Abu Hannoud the hero of the northern Osaira battle at the so-called state security court. The court sentenced Abu Hannoud to 12 years behind bars! The “comic” trial took five minutes only!

The charges were: first forming armed cells and supplying them with arms and second establishing an alternative authority to that of the PA! The hero Abu Hannoud’s response to those charges was: “I am a Mujahid for the cause of Allah and what I have done was a Jihad against occupying enemies and in defense of my country and people.”

Our people as well as our Nation have been surprised over the trial of the hero Abu Hannoud and with the oppressive verdict passed against him. The defense team that was composed of more than a hundred lawyer from within Palestine and others from Egypt and Jordan, who volunteered to defend the Mujahid hero was also surprised by the sentence. The team was not informed with date of the trial or the indictment list but rather the court hearing was arranged under the guise of darkness. To cap the comedy, a police lieutenant who does not have a license to practice law was assigned to defend Abu Hannoud.

We in the Islamic Resistance Movement, Hamas, in the light of the crime of trying Mujahid Abu Hannoud would like to affirm the following:

• We condemn this trial or any other trial against this hero and his likes of the Mujahideen. And we condemn the policy of arresting them for the heroic Mujahideen should be honored and their heroism glorified and not imprisoned and tried.

• This trial against Mujahid Abu Hannoud is a national crime that made light of our people’s feelings and convictions. It further shocked the feelings of our Arab and Islamic masses.

• This trial is merely a humiliating submission to demands and conditions of the occupation, which impose on the PA and its security apparatuses protection of occupation and security coordination with the Zionist Mossad and Shabak along with the CIA and persecuting and arresting Mujahideen. This summary trial posed as an immolation offered by the PA on the eve of its upcoming meeting with CIA chief George Tenet and US president Clinton.

• This phony trial and its oppressive verdict affirm our people’s conviction that the PA had no justice and affirm absence of integrity and independence at its court and judiciary. This reminds our people of the years of scores of make believe courts and tyrannical verdicts conducted by that Authority over the past few years.

• The trial and the harsh verdicts should be rather passed against the leaders of the Zionist enemy and their herds of soldiers who wreaked havoc in the village of northern Osaira at night. They forced its inhabitants out of their homes at gunpoint, demolished one of the houses and destroyed many apartments, where was the PA’s leaders and judges towards that enemy’s crime?

• We call on the PA in the name of our people within and outside Palestine and on behalf of the Arab and Islamic masses to cancel that trial and its verdict. We call for the immediate release of Mujahid Abu Hannoud, the termination of such trials and the annulment of their verdicts against him and his colleagues the Mujahideen and other notable figures of our people. Our cause today especially in the light of threats against Al-Quds (Jerusalem) and the Aqsa was in dire need of their Jihad and efforts, which necessitate the immediate release of Mujahid Mohammed Daif and other Mujahideen along with other notable figures such as Dr. Ranteesi, Dr. Makadme, Sheikh Jamal Natshe and Sheikh Jamal Mansour.

• We greet and hail our people in the West Bank and Gaza Strip who expressed solidarity with Mujahid Abu Hannoud and flocked into the village of northern Osaira to support its inhabitants. We also highly appreciate the efforts of the lawyers in the defense team who volunteered to defend the Mujahid Abu Hannoud.

• We urge our people in all cities, villages and Palestinian refugee camps along with political forces, popular bodies, professional syndicates and students to express denunciation of the PA’s crime of arresting and trying the Mujahid Abu Hannoud. We ask them to express their anger and dismay by all possible means so as to put an end to the Authority’s contempt and challenge of our people’s feelings and compel it release him and all his brothers the Mujahideen.

“So lose not heart. Nor fall into despair: for ye must gain mastery if ye are true in Faith.” (Quran 3/139)

“O ye who believe! If ye obey the unbelievers, they will drive you back on your heels, and ye will turn back (from Faith) to your own loss.” (Quran 3/149)

The Islamic Resistance Movement
(Hamas – Palestine)
Saturday 2 September 2000