Hamas leader telephones Maulana Fazl, discusses conflict with Israel

PESHAWAR: Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal on Tuesday held a telephonic conversation with Jamiat-e-Ulema Islam-Fazl (JUI-F) head Maulana Fazlur Rehman and discussed the ongoing conflict with Israel, ARY News reported.

In a statement, JUI-F spokesperson Aslam Ghauri said that Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal apprised Maulana Fazlur Rehman of the current situation between Palestine and Israel.

According to the spokesman, Meshaal lauded the JUI-F for celebrating ‘Al-Aqsa Flood’ – a surprise attack launched by Palestinian group Hamas against Israel.

Speaking on the occasion, Maulana Fazlur Rehman said that they stood by Palestinians amid the conflict, adding that they will leave Palestinian brothers and sisters alone under any circumstances.

He also urged human rights organisations to take notice of Israel’s brutalities in Gaza – which killed over 1800 Palestinians.

Khaled Meshaal was Hamas leader from 1996 until 2017 before he was succeeded by incumbent chief Ismail Haniyeh.

Israel calls last week’s devastating attack by Hamas its 9/11 moment. The secretive mastermind behind the assault, Palestinian fighter Mohammed Deif, calls it Al Aqsa Flood.

The phrase Israel’s most wanted man used in an audio tape broadcast as Hamas fired thousands of rockets out of the Gaza strip on Saturday signalled the attack was payback for Israeli raids at Jerusalem’s Al Aqsa mosque.

It was in May 2021, after a raid on Islam’s third holiest site that enraged the Arab and Muslim world, when Mohammed Deif began planning the operation that has killed more than 1,200 people in Israel, according to a source close to Hamas in Gaza.

More than two years on, Saturday’s assault, the worst breach in Israeli defences since the 1973 Arab-Israeli conflict, pushed Israel to declare war and launch retaliatory strikes on Gaza that had killed more than 1800 people by Friday.

A survivor of seven Israeli assassination attempts, the most recent in 2021, Deif rarely speaks and never appears in public. So when Hamas’s TV channel announced he was about to speak on Saturday, Palestinians knew something significant was afoot.

“Today the rage of Al Aqsa, the rage of our people and nation is exploding. Our mujahedeen (fighters), today is your day to make this criminal understand that his time has ended,” Deif said in the recording.