Israel helps muslims participate in Mecca pilgrimage

The irony is almost comical: Despite ongoing attacks, Israel helps Muslims make hajj while Hamas bars them
Dec. 10, 2008

Freedom of religion is stronger in Israel than in the Hamas-run Gaza Strip. Hamas is spending more of its time trying to aim rockets at Israel rather than allow its fellow Gazans head to Mecca for the Muslim hajj.

Muslims and Druze in Israel and around the world are celebrating the Festival of Sacrifice (Eid al-Adha), which began Dec. 8 and commemorates the end of the religious pilgrimage (hajj) to Mecca. More than 11,000 Israeli-Arabs and Palestinian pilgrims - including 6,000 Palestinians from the West Bank - passed through the Israeli-Jordanian Allenby border crossing to participate in the hajj this year.

Throwing a wet blanket on the Mecca parade however is Hamas in Gaza. The fundamentalist terror organization has prevented its residents from participating in the hajj for the first time in 35 years, denying thousands of pilgrims the right to religious freedom.

“Unfortunately, this is the first time in the history of the Palestinian people that pilgrims were prevented. Israel never once prevented pilgrims,” Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas told reporters in Mecca,.

Worshipers seeking to cross the border into Egypt for the hajj were beaten back by Hamas’ police. Gaza tour company owners who tried to gain permits to travel from West Bank companies were arrested.

“Even the Israelis never dared prevent the pilgrimage this way,” said Maher Amin, owner of a Gaza tour company.

Hamas seized control of Gaza in a bloody coup in the summer of 2007 creating a civil war between two Palestinian parties: Hamas and Fatah, Abbas' party ruling in the West Bank. During the Hamas coup, many Fatah loyalists were rounded up and assassinated while others fled for the Israeli border. Israel evacuated many to the West Bank.