Senior Hamas politburo member Mousa Abu Marzouk says he would not have backed the October 7, 2023, invasion of southern Israel if he had known what the consequences would be for the Gaza Strip after thousands of Hamas-led terrorists slaughtered 1,200 people and took 251 hostages.
“If it was expected that what happened would happen, there wouldn’t have been October 7,” he says in an interview with The New York Times.
The Qatar-based official says Hamas’s survival was a “kind of victory” but ultimately, Hamas cannot claim to have defeated Israel.
“We’re talking about a party that lost control of itself and took revenge against everything,” says Abu Marzouk of Israel. “That is not a victory under any circumstances.”
He also tells the Times that Hamas is ready to consider proposals for disarmament: “We are ready to speak about every issue. Any issue that is put on the table, we need to speak about it.”
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