Senior Hamas official Mahmoud al-Zahar told Britain’s Sky News on Monday that Hamas is open to talking with U.S. President Joe Biden.
“Why not? Mr. Biden, yes, he is supporting Israel, but I think we have a mission as Palestinian people to speak to him frankly,” he told host Mark Stone.
When asked by Stone if the State of Israel has the right to exist, Zahar replied: “No. Why? You are coming from America and you take my house, you came from Britain and you took my brother’s house, you took this. This is a settlement.”
He also acknowledged Hamas’s rationale to target Israeli civilians, as was seen relentlessly in the past two weeks.
And Zahar predicted that the current ceasefire would be maintained, albeit with a caveat.
“The new element here is the degree of the resistance movement, in particular in Gaza, to attack the Israeli targets and very important points, including most of the overcrowded areas ... the civilian society,” he said. “So for how long will the Israelis accept that?”
