'Son of Hamas': Taking down Hamas is a necessity

Mosab Hassan Yousef, son of Hamas founder, tells Channel 2 that Israel must educate the Palestinians that it isn't the enemy.

By TAMARA ZIEVE
MOSAB HASSAN YOUSEF 370 (photo credit: Marc Israel Sellem/The Jerusalem Post)
MOSAB HASSAN YOUSEF 370
(photo credit: Marc Israel Sellem/The Jerusalem Post)
Taking down the Hamas regime is a necessity, Mosab Hassan Yousef, the son of Hamas founder Sheikh Hassan Yousef told Channel 2 on Friday night.
Ramallah-born Yousef spent his early years as a Hamas activist and went through more than a few stints in Israeli prison. But for 10 years, Yousef was “the Green Prince,” a code name given to him by the Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency), with whom he worked to prevent dozens of terrorist attacks during the second intifada, saving hundreds of Israeli lives.
In an interview with Channel 2 from the US, where he now lives, Yousef addressed the recent Operation Pillar of Defense: “I believe that the Shabak (Israel Security Agency) did everything in their ability.
“Let’s not forget that our enemy is a barbarian enemy and they are using women and children as shelter, and in situations like this we [Israel] are very limited, because we care about our citizens,” he added.
He said that Israel must work very hard to take down the Hamas regime, which he described as a “necessity... not for the sake of Israel only, but for the sake of humanity.”
“Hamas was born to destroy, Hamas doesn’t know how to build,” he remarked. “The question is how we do that without killing many innocent Palestinian children who have no idea what’s going on and don’t see the whole picture,” he continued.
He opined that the answer is to “win the moderate voices on the other side and not to force everyone to think the same way that Hamas thinks.”
He asserted that Israel has a responsibility to educate the Palestinian public.
“Why don’t we have TV stations, radio stations?” he asked. “We need to expose these lies and educate the Palestinians that Israel is not the enemy, Israel actually helps the people of Gaza everyday more than anyone else,” he said, listing Israeli provisions of electricity, money and humanitarian support.
“We need the average Palestinian to see this clearly,” he stated, explaining that miscommunication leads “the average Palestinian person” to listen to Hamas’s lies.
Melanie Lidman contributed to this report.