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https://www.jns.org/the-myth-that-israel-netanyahu-created-funded-hamas/

A quote circulating on social media about Netanyahu and Hamas comes from a Haaretz hit piece on Netanyahu.

“’Anyone who wants to thwart the establishment of a Palestinian state has to support bolstering Hamas and transferring money to Hamas,’ he told a meeting of his Likud party’s Knesset members in March 2019. ‘This is part of our strategy—to isolate the Palestinians in Gaza from the Palestinians in the West Bank.’”

The actual source is supposedly the biography of Haim Ramon, who had not served in the government since 2009, and certainly not in the Likud.

Ramon, a leftist politician, had been convicted of sexual harassment, partially ending his political career. He certainly had not been a Likud member and was not attending any such meetings, raising serious credibility issues regarding the quote.

But the Qatar deal was certainly unpopular in the conservative Likud Party, and it’s not impossible that Netanyahu might have tried to rationalize it to right-wing members in those terms.

That’s not, however, why the deal was made. It was made to stop Hamas attacks on some of the same communities now under attack.

Haaretz’s elite defense editor, Amos Harel, wrote a defense of the deal when it was made, titled, “Images of Qatari Cash Flowing Into Gaza May Embarrass Netanyahu—but Alternative Is War”

He argued that “continued pressure on the Strip will lead to an explosion, which in turn will lead to an Israeli ground operation in Gaza, heavy casualties followed by desperate negotiations over who will assume responsibility for Gaza’s population—or in other words, a return to square one. And if Israel has nothing to gain by invading Gaza, it ought to try any other possible solution before going to war….

The Haaretz hit piece on Netanyahu is hypocritical because the paper supported the policy.

The policy was terrible. I argued against it. So did anyone seriously concerned about fighting Islamic terrorism. The problem with it was not that Netanyahu was hawkish, but that he was too liberal and prone to giving in to pressure.