Did British Prime Minister David Cameron have some special reason for pandering to Ankara? Or is he simply clueless on Islamist terrorism and the Middle East?
Speaking Tuesday in the Turkish capital, Cameron called Gaza a “prison camp.”
No, Prime Minister. Gaza is not a prison camp. It is a terrorist camp.
Gaza is controlled by Hamas, an Iranian-backed terrorist group, whose leaders seized all power in the enclave in a bloody coup in 2007 — slaughtering Palestinian rivals. Hamas is dedicated in its charter to obliterating the sovereign state of Israel, hostile generally to the values of free societies, and dedicated on its current turf in Gaza to imposing strict Islamic law. Hamas has launched thousands of rockets into neighboring Israel. The reason for the Israeli blockade is to keep weapons out of Gaza — from which Israel withdrew entirely in 2005, trusting that the “international community” would help ensure a future there of peaceful coexistence. Instead, what’s emerged is a terrorist enclave, its staple needs sustained by enormous handouts from the U.S. and European Union, while Hamas spends resources on propaganda and weapons.
The real answer for Gaza is an end to Hamas, and an end to Iran’s tyrannical regime and its toxic influence both in the Middle East and beyond — extending, apparently, to such places as London. Whatever constituency Cameron is playing to, he’s kidding himself if he fails to understand that with utterances such as this latest in Turkey, he is giving a nod to Islamist terrorism. That is all too likely to come home to roost.
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