Dear Friend of FLAME:

When ISIS beheaded American journalist James Foley, President Obama expressed his outrage and called ISIS a "cancer" that must be prevented from spreading.  A visibly agitated Secretary of State Kerry declared that ISIS is "evil" and "must be destroyed."

These angry characterizations are no doubt accurate, and few in the West will argue about the need to defeat ISIS---even though the group has so far not attacked the United States.

We wonder, though, why Mr. Obama and Mr. Kerry can be so adamant about the evil of ISIS, yet so keen to insist that Israel stop fighting with Hamas, an equally brutal terrorist group that has been trying to commit genocide on the Jewish people for its entire existence.

There are certainly differences between ISIS and Hamas, just as there are differences between al Qaeda and the murderous Nigerian Islamic terrorist group Boko Haram.  Yet these groups have common values, strategies and goals---and all are evil.

Here are three defining qualities that these Islamist groups---ISIS, Hamas, al Qaeda and Boko Haram---share:

• —All want to establish a worldwide caliphate (or empire) under strict sharia law. That means they are dedicated to conquering and colonizing the lands of other religious, national and ethnic groups.
• All four groups believe that their jihad justifies killing innocent civilians---including Muslims---through terrorist acts, like suicide bombs, rocket attacks and beheadings.
• These groups all consider Christians, Jews, Hindus and any religious groups outside of Islam to be infidels, subject to second-class citizenship at best and, more commonly, exile or death.

Does President Obama really think that ISIS should be destroyed, but not Hamas?  American assassinations of al Qaeda leaders confirm a U.S. commitment to destroying al Qaeda, but where is the U.S. commitment to destroying Hamas?

It's ominous that we heard no encouragement from Obama and Kerry for Israel to destroy the Gaza-based Islamist terrorists who attacked Israel and launched more than 4,000 missiles at Jewish and Arab Israelis in just four months.  Why is that?

Rather, we heard U.S. criticism that Israel, despite all Herculean efforts to spare innocent Palestinians, was too aggressive, used too much military force.

This week's FLAME Hotline featured article, by Harvard professor Alan Dershowitz, makes an iron-clad case for destroying both terror groups---and further, for allowing Israel to do what's necessary to defend itself against any enemy that threatens its existence.

Please take a few minutes to review Dershowitz's compelling argument. It gives you all the facts you need to speak to friends and colleagues and write letters to the editor.  Please also pass this issue along to your contacts, and use social media to refer your friends to it.

Thanks for your support of FLAME and of Israel!

Best regards,

Jim Sinkinson
Vice President, Facts and Logic About the Middle East (FLAME)

P.S.

While Israel bravely defended itself from direct attacks by the Gaza-based Islamist terror group, Hamas, the world complained that Israel's response was disproportionate.  Yet now the U.S. has begun striking back at ISIS---and is greeted with thanks from all corners---as though fighting ISIS and Hamas terrorists were not the same struggle against the same global jihad.  To connect the dots for the President, Congress and the American people, FLAME this week began publishing a new hasbarah---public relations---effort in national and college media reaching 10 million readers.  It's called "ISIS, Hamas and the Black Flag of Global Jihad." We have also sent this message to every U.S. Congress member and President Obama. I hope you'll review this powerful piece and pass it on to your contacts who will benefit from its message. If you agree that FLAME's outspoken brand of public relations on Israel's behalf is critical, I urge you to help us continue to run this ad, so that Americans will realize that ISIS and Hamas pose the identical threat to the U.S. and the world. Please consider giving a donation now, as you're able---with $500, $250, $100, or even $18. (Remember, your donation to FLAME is tax deductible.) To donate online, just go to http://www.factsandlogic.org/make_a_donation.html. Now more than ever we need your help to ensure that Israel gets the support it needs---from the U.S. Congress, from President Obama, and from the American people.

ISIS Is to America as Hamas Is to Israel

by Alan M. Dershowitz, Gatestone Institute, August 20, 2014<

President Barack Obama has rightfully condemned the ISIS beheading of American James Foley in the strongest terms. This is what he said:

"There has to be a common effort to extract this cancer so it does not spread. There has to be a clear rejection of these kinds of nihilistic ideologies. One thing we can all agree on is group like (ISIS) has no place in the 21st century. Friends and allies around the world, we share a common security a set of values opposite of what we saw yesterday. We will continue to confront this hateful terrorism and replace it with a sense of hope and stability."

At the same time that President Obama has called for an all-out war against the "cancer" of ISIS, he has regarded Hamas as having an easily curable disease, urging Israel to accept that terrorist group, whose charter calls for Israel's destruction, as part of a Palestinian unity government. I cannot imagine him urging Iraq, or any other Arab country, to accept ISIS as part of a unity government.

Former President Jimmy Carter and Bishop Desmond Tutu have gone even further, urging the international community to recognize the legitimacy of Hamas as a political party and to grant it diplomatic recognition. It is hard to imagine them demanding that the same legitimate status be accorded ISIS.

Why then the double standard regarding ISIS and Hamas? Is it because ISIS is less brutal and violent than Hamas? It's hard to make that case. Hamas has probably killed more civilians — through its suicide bombs, its murder of Palestinian Authority members, its rocket attacks and its terror tunnels — than ISIS has done. If not for Israel's Iron Dome and the Israeli Defense Forces, Hamas would have killed even more innocent civilians. Indeed its charter calls for the killing of all Jews anywhere in the world, regardless of where they live or which "rock" they are hiding behind. If Hamas had its way, it would kill as least as many people as ISIS would.

Is it the manner by which ISIS kills? Beheading is of course a visibly grotesque means of killing, but dead is dead and murder is murder. And it matters little to the victim's family whether the death was caused by beheading, by hanging or by a bullet in the back of a head. Indeed most of ISIS's victims have been shot rather than beheaded, while Hamas terrorists have slaughtered innocent babies in their beds, teenagers on the way home from school, women shopping, Jews praying and students eating pizza.

Is it because ISIS murdered an American? Hamas has murdered numerous Americans and citizens of other countries. They too are indiscriminate in who they kill.

Is it because ISIS has specifically threatened to bring its terrorism to American shores, while Hamas focuses its terrorism in Israel? The Hamas Charter does not limit its murderous intentions to one country. Like ISIS it calls for a worldwide "caliphate," brought about by violent Jihad.

Everything we rightly fear and despise from ISIS we should fear and despise from Hamas. Just as we would never grant legitimacy to ISIS, we should not grant legitimacy to Hamas—at the very least until it rescinds its charter and renounces violence. Unfortunately that is about as likely as America rescinding its constitution. Violence, anti-Semitism and anti-Americanism are the sine qua non of Hamas' mission.

Just as ISIS must be defeated militarily and destroyed as a terrorist army, so too must Hamas be responded to militarily and its rockets and tunnels destroyed.

It is widely, and in my view mistakenly, argued by many academics and diplomats that there can never be a military solution to terrorism in general or to the demands of Hamas in particular. This conventional wisdom ignores the lessons of history. Chamberlain thought there could be a diplomatic solution to Hitler's demands. Churchill disagreed. History proved Churchill correct. Nazi Fascists and Japanese militarists had to be defeated militarily before a diplomatic resolution could be achieved.

So too with ISIS and Hamas. They must first be defeated militarily and only then might they consider accepting reasonable diplomatic and political compromises. Another similarity between ISIS and Hamas is that if these terrorist groups were to lay down their arms, there might be peace, whereas if their enemies were to lay down their arms, there would be genocide.

A wonderful cartoon illustrates this: at one end of the table is Hamas demanding "Death to all Jews" At the other end is Israel's Prime Minister Netanyahu. In the middle sits the mediator, who turns to Netanyahu and asks: "Could you at least meet him half way?"

No democratic nation can accept its own destruction. We cannot compromise — come half way — with terrorists who demand the deaths of all who stand in the way of their demand for a Sunni caliphate, whether these terrorists call themselves ISIS or Hamas. Both are, in the words of President Obama, "cancers" that must be extracted before they spread. Both are equally malignant. Both must be defeated on the battlefield, in the court of public opinion and in the courts of law. There can be no compromise with bigotry, terrorism or the demand for a caliphate. Before Hamas or ISIS can be considered legitimate political partners, they must give up their violent quest for a worldwide Islamic caliphate.

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