Hamas official vows legal action against Blinken for ‘partnership’ in Israeli ‘crimes’

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken will be prosecuted for his role in the war in Gaza, says a senior Hamas official.

“His statements are misleading and we do not trust them, and his partnership in the crimes against our people will be pursued legally,” threatens Hamas politburo member Osama Hamdan at a press conference in Algeria, calling Blinken “a partner in the war of extermination.”

In a weekend interview with The New York Times, Blinken put the blame squarely on Hamas for the failure to reach a hostage release agreement.

“What we’ve seen time and again is Hamas not concluding a deal that it should have concluded,” Blinken said.

“Why there hasn’t been a unanimous chorus around the world for Hamas to put down its weapons, to give up the hostages, to surrender — I don’t know what the answer is to that. Israel, on various occasions, has offered safe passage to Hamas’s leadership and fighters out of Gaza. Where is the world? Where is the world saying, Yeah, do that! End this! Stop the suffering of people that you brought on!” he said.

Hamdan claims that negotiations with Israel have proven that the only way to achieve rights for the Palestinians is by force.

“We are determined to stop the aggression and for the enemy to withdraw from the Gaza Strip, and for relief and reconstruction to be without Israeli conditions,” says Hamdan. “We hope that this will be achieved as soon as possible.”

He calls for a “national committee” to manage Gaza and “block the path of every corrupt argument that seeks to oppress our people.”

Indirect talks on a potential hostage deal between Israel and Hamas continue in Qatar, but progress has been slow.

Hamdan says that Hamas hopes that Syria “will remain in the position of resistance” due to Israel’s control of the Golan Heights and beyond. “One of the most important values ​​launched by Al-Aqsa Flood [the Hamas name for the October 7, 2023, terror onslaught] is that peoples will not be liberated except through resistance.”

Referring to a wave of legal complaints against IDF soldiers vacationing abroad, Hamdan says that “pursuing Zionist war criminals is a Palestinian national goal and a goal for all free people in the world. Those who raised the case in Brazil and elsewhere are people whose consciences pushed them to take action against the crimes of the occupation. Those who commit crimes of genocide must be pursued all over the world.”