In his book Son of Hamas, Mosab Hassan Yousef says, “I am the son of a people who have been enslaved by corrupt systems for many centuries” (p. 248). One of those corrupt systems, in his view, is the Israeli government: “I was a prisoner of the Israelis when my eyes were opened to the fact that the Palestinian people were as oppressed by their own leaders as they were by Israel….Delivered from the oppression of Europe, Israel became the oppressor” (pp. 249-250).
Israel is the oppressor of the Palestinians? It sounds as if Mosab Hassan Yousef hasn’t modified his old Hamas views all that much — for if the Palestinians would cut out the jihad against Israel, they would immediately find that Israeli “oppression” would end. But he doesn’t seem to take that into account.
This doesn’t mean I think he should have been deported. That he was considered for deportation at all is another blot on the much-marred record of the Obama Administration. But I am surprised that the Jewish groups that are so earnestly championing his cause don’t seem to have read his book very closely.
UPDATE: Pamela Geller adds: “I heard him on the radio yesterday speak of the Israelis killing children, which took me aback.”
“Judge agrees to grant asylum to ex-Israeli spy,” by Elliot Spagat for AP, June 30 (thanks to all who sent this in):
SAN DIEGO — The son of a Hamas founder who became a Christian and an Israeli spy will be granted U.S. asylum after he passes a routine background check, an immigration judge ruled Wednesday.
Mosab Hassan Yousef got the news during a 15-minute deportation hearing after a U.S. Department of Homeland Security attorney said the government was dropping its objections.
The agency denied Yousef’s asylum request in February 2009, arguing that he had been involved in terrorism and was a threat to the United States.
Attorney Kerri Calcador gave no explanation for the government’s change of heart….
In his book, Yousef describes growing up admiring Hamas and hating Israel, leading him to buy a couple machine guns and a handgun in 1996. He said the guns didn’t work and that he was arrested by Israeli forces before he killed anyone….