Charging the dead and the unreachable.
Last night, we published my post on the Biden-Harris Justice Department’s criminal complaint against Hamas — which is to say, the Harris presidential-campaign document in which they hope you don’t notice that there is about as much chance that the living “defendants” will ever see the inside of an American courtroom as there is that United States prosecutors will try Ismael Haniyeh — the dead guy who is named as the lead defendant in the case.
On further review, the complaint is even more ridiculous than I first understood (which is saying something). It turns out that three of the six terrorists charged are dead — Haniyeh, Mohammed al-Masri (who was better known as Mohammed Deif), and Marwan Issa.
Just so you grasp the cynicism here, the Justice Department well knows that the dead cannot be prosecuted. Haniyeh was killed by an IDF assassination in Tehran five weeks ago, Deif was taken out two weeks before that, and Issa was offed about five months ago. Yet, this terror trio was left in a charging instrument unsealed yesterday (and, I suspect, written into it despite the notoriety of their deaths). This is not a criminal case. It’s theater.
The Democratic presidential nominee, Vice President Harris, continues her struggle to become unburdened by what has been — in this instance, her four-year performance as the No. 2 official in the Biden-Harris administration, a full partner in its dreadful record. On the national-security front, that includes inaction on jihadist terrorism, sympathy for Hamas, and appeasement of Iran. Hence, the criminal complaint. With no possibility of prosecution, it’s a cost-free way of suggesting to the country that Kamala is a national-security hawk . . . and never you mind about the Biden-Harris administration’s catastrophic delivery of Afghanistan (and billions in U.S. weapons) to the Taliban, the consequent encouragement of Putin to invade Ukraine, and the filling of Iran’s coffers with billions in sanctions-free oil revenue — knowing the world’s leading state sponsor of anti-American terrorism, which has pledged to destroy Israel, would use the windfall to arm Hezbollah, arm Hamas, arm the Houthis, arm their other proxies in Iraq and Syria, target American forces in scores of attacks, attempt to shut down international trade through jihadist piracy, and destroy Israel in a brutal multi-front war.
A powerful nation that takes its defense seriously never responds to a foreign military enemy’s mass-murder attacks by filing a lawsuit. This one is even more unserious than that suggests because (a) as the Biden-Harris administration well knows, none of these alien enemy combatants, er, I mean, criminal defendants, will ever be arrested and extradited to the United States; (b) the complaint’s 38-page recitation of the history of Hamas and its predations on Americans as well as Israelis demonstrates that, if the administration were serious about charging Hamas, it could have done so at any time over the past four years; and (c) astonishingly, this impotent administration pose as counterterrorist tough-guy is timed as a response to Hamas’s cold-blooded murder last week of Hersh Goldberg-Polin, a 23-year-old American hostage for whom, through his eleven months of captivity by a terrorist organization designated as such under U.S. law for almost 30 years, the Biden-Harris administration took no meaningful action against Hamas. Indeed, it emboldened Hamas by hectoring Israel to agree to a cease-fire that would leave Hamas in place and guarantee future 10/7 attacks . . . and thus the future taking of American and Israeli hostages.
For a sense of the absurdity of the Biden-Harris DOJ’s court filing, there’s this from the accompanying press release, describing the “defendants” (my italics):
Ismail Haniyeh was the chairman of Hamas’s Politburo from 2017 until his reported death on or about July 31. Prior to 2017, Haniyeh was the deputy chairman of the Politburo and the leader of Hamas in the Gaza Strip. Haniyeh was based principally in Turkey and Qatar.
Yahya Sinwar, also known as Abu Ibrahim, 61, is the leader of Hamas. Previously, beginning in approximately 2017, he was the leader of Hamas in the Gaza Strip, and is one of the founders of the al-Qassam Brigades. Sinwar is based principally in the Gaza Strip.
Mohammad Al-Masri, also known as Mohammed Deif and al Khalid al-Deif, was the commander in chief of the al-Qassam Brigades, a position he held from in or about 2002 until his reported death on or about July 13. Al-Masri was based principally in the Gaza Strip.
Marwan Issa, also known as Abu Baraa, was the deputy commander of the al-Qassam Brigades from approximately 2007 until his reported death on or about March 10. Issa was based principally in the Gaza Strip.
Khaled Meshaal, also known as Abu al-Waleed, 68, was the chairman of Hamas’ Politburo from approximately 2004 to 2017 and is now the head of Hamas’ diaspora office — effectively responsible for Hamas’ official presence outside of the Gaza Strip and the West Bank. Meshaal is based principally in Qatar.
Ali Baraka, 57, has been Hamas’ head of National Relations Abroad since approximately 2019, and was previously Hamas’s representative in Lebanon. Baraka is based principally in Lebanon.
If your keeping score, that’s three dead terrorists and three terrorists who are either in the Gaza combat zone or being given safe-haven by Lebanon (run by Iran’s jihadist militia Hezbollah) and Qatar (Iran’s close ally and a chief Hamas abettor, which the Biden-Harris administration has remarkably designated a “Major Non-NATO Ally”).
More gaslighting from the press release:
Throughout Hamas’ existence, the organization’s ability to carry out acts of terrorism, including the October 7 Hamas Massacres, has been fueled in part by the Government of Iran, particularly the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and its Qods Force (IRGC-QF) — the element of the IRGC responsible for conducting external terrorism operations and providing support to terrorist groups — which has supported, supplied, and trained Hamas, and by the Lebanon-based Shia Islamic terrorist organization Hizballah. Hamas’ attacks have played a significant role in the Government of Iran’s regional and global campaign of supporting terrorism to weaken and ultimately destroy both the United States and Israel. Hamas’ leaders, including the defendants, have been instrumental in Hamas’ relationship with the Government of Iran, including through personal communications with leaders in the Iranian regime. Emblematic of this close relationship, Ismail inaction on, who had been the chairman of Hamas’s Politburo since 2017, was reported killed in Iran on or about July 31, while visiting Tehran to attend the swearing-in of Iran’s President. Hamas’ leaders, including the defendants, have acknowledged the importance of the support from the Government of Iran and Hizballah to Hamas’ ability to carry out the October 7 Hamas Massacres, including the IRGC-QF providing Hamas, among other things, rockets and technical assistance necessary to build rockets, and extensive funding for Hamas’ terror wing.
As we have extensively covered through these four years (see, e.g., here, here, here, here, here, here, and here), the Biden-Harris administration’s signature foreign-policy project has been to undo the Trump administration’s maximum-pressure campaign against the rabidly anti-American regime in Tehran. Biden and Harris have enriched the mullahs, knowing they use funding to arm Hamas and other jihadist groups; construct ballistic missiles and drones that they share with their ally, Russia, for use of its war of aggression against Ukraine; and develop nuclear weapons (the Biden-Harris passivity on that front has left Iran so close that we must assume it could conduct a test-firing at any time).
But now, Harris and Biden want us to know they realize that Iran has been backing Hamas all along as it conspired to kill Americans. And to illustrate Harris’s boundless determination to hold Iran accountable, the administration is doing nothing about Iran and filing criminal charges against the dead and the unreachable.