The movie and morality of Hamas regarding kidnapped soldier Gilat Shalit

This week, the armed wing of Hamas — Izzadin Al-Qassam Brigades — tried to expand their portfolio into the realm of the creative, releasing a “cartoon” video about kidnapped IDF soldier Gilad Shalit.

Message to the terrorists of Hamas:  You might be effective at killing, kidnapping, coercion and smuggling, but as cinematic artists — propagandists would be a more accurate term — you’re sadly lacking.

All your animated short film managed to do was to emphasize the cynical cruelty and contempt for life that motivated you to kidnap Shalit in the first place.

The movie depicts Shalit’s father, Noam, experiencing a nightmare in which he wanders deserted streets looking at billboards showing Israeli leaders making promises to work for his son’s release. At the end, having wandered for many years, he is shown awaiting the release of his son at the Erez checkpoint in Gaza, only to be met by his son’s casket.

As the father screams “No!” a message appears — “There is still hope” — followed by the emblem of Hamas.

As if Hamas knows anything about “hope,” other than how to destroy it.

The film attempts to convey the message that the eventual death of Shalit will be Israel’s fault, not that of Hamas itself, as if viewers are supposed to forget that Hamas staged the kidnapping to begin with — and that if Shalit’s casket did indeed turn up, it would be Hamas who will have murdered him.

This is yet another intellectually anemic example of an oft-used Palestinian paradigm: Commit a violent offense, await the Israeli response to that offense, then portray yourself as the victim as the response is carried out.

To call such thinking moral ambiguity would be to give it far more dignity than it actually deserves. It is, more honestly, immorality posing as morality — the predator assuming the disguise of the prey.

The phrase “moral ambiguity,” however, did come to mind this week when it was reported that a prominent leader and co-founder of Hamas, Mahmoud al-Zahar, came out with a denunciation of the Hamas video.

For a moment, we thought that the unthinkable had happened — a Hamasnik finally coming to his senses. We were wrong.

Al-Zahar’s condemnation of the video was based on the notion that, “We have not killed in the past and will never kill captive Israeli soldiers,” to use his own words. “Our morals prevent us from doing so.”

Once again, the assumption of morality by the immoral — by the kidnapper.

To al-Zahar, it is apparently immoral to murder a captive Israeli, but not to make him a captive by kidnapping him. It is apparently not immoral to threaten to kill the captive (as Hamas has repeatedly done) if their demands are not met; and not immoral to exchange a young soldier, whose only goal was to defend his country, for hundreds of terrorists, many of whom already have Israeli and Palestinian blood on their hands, even as others wish for the chance to earn such a mark of distinction.

Hamas may yet get its wish to exchange Shalit for hundreds of its bloody colleagues, but it won’t happen because Israelis are intimidated, demoralized or confused by Hamas’ lame attempt at a propaganda movie, or by any of its twisted claims of “morality.”

It will happen only because Israelis place great value on life, including that of a single soldier. Hamas, a death culture if ever there was one, might understand that notion insofar as they can exploit it for their own gain, but they will never feel it in their hearts.