Britain’s decision to outlaw Palestinian resistance movement Hamas has continued to draw condemnations, with the head of Hamas saying the resistance movement derives its legitimacy from the Palestinian nation and the free people of the world.
“These decisions, which are of a political, electoral, and biased nature in favor of Israel, will not find any place or influence among the people, the freedom-seekers, the elites, and the groups that support Palestine,” Head of the Political Bureau of Hamas Ismail Haniyeh said on Saturday.
UK Home Secretary Priti Patel on Friday announced that she had designated Hamas as a terrorist organization, in a move that brings Britain in line with the United States and the European Union.
Britain’s Home Department confirmed that Hamas would be banned under the Terrorism Act and anyone expressing support for it, flying its flag, or arranging meetings for the resistance movement would be in breach of the law.
Haniyeh said Patel’s decision is a “new attack on our people and their rights and is a condemned and deplorable step that depicts [Britain’s] bias toward the Zionist regime.”
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The move demonstrates the occupying regime’s attempts to criminalize the struggle of the Palestinian people, he stressed.
This will not “deter us from continuing to defend our people and their rights by all legitimate means through comprehensive resistance,” Haniyeh added.
In a separate statement, Hamas said “resisting occupation by all available means, including armed resistance, is a right granted to people under occupation as stated by the international law.”
