LSE defends hosting launch of book that says Hamas wrongly vilified since 7 October
EXCLUSIVE: Co-authors of Understanding Hamas claim branding the group 'terrorist' has meant 'demonisation intensified after the events in southern Israel' on 7 October 2023
Lee Harpin is the Jewish News's political editor
The London School of Economics has defended its decision to stage the launch of a book at its Middle East Centre which claims Hamas has been wrongly “vilified and demonised” since carrying out the 7 October massacre.
The book’s co-authors Helen Cobban and Rami G Khouri also use the 244-page Understanding Hamas And Why That Matters to claim that the Islamic group has undergone a “transformation from early anti-Jewish tendencies” and now “differentiates between Judaism and Zionism”.
The book claims branding Hamas “as ‘terrorist’ or worse,” has meant “demonisation intensified after the events in Southern Israel on October 7, 2023.”
Promoting the event on the LSE website, it is claimed Hamas has been “subjected to intense vilification” in mainstream Western discourse as a result of the classification in many Western states as a proscribed terrorist group.
The 10 March launch also features a line-up of other academic speakers who have condemned Israel and Zionism and criticised attempts to portray Hamas as “irrational terrorists”.
Asked about its decision to allow an apparently overwhelmingly one-sided event that sought to question the government’s decision to proscribe Hamas as a terrorist organisation to take place at the LSE, a spokesperson for the university said:”Free speech and freedom of expression underpins everything we do at LSE.
“Students, staff and visitors are strongly encouraged to discuss and debate the most pressing issues around the world. ”
Promotional text on the LSE’s Middle East Centre web page initially stated: “Across Western mainstream discourse, the Palestinian resistance movement Hamas has been subjected to intense vilification. Branding it as “terrorist” or worse, this demonisation intensified after the events in Southern Israel on October 7, 2023.”
But after Jewish News approached the university on Tuesday morning, the text was altered to begin: “It is claimed in the book that across Western mainstream discourse……”
The website then adds: “This book does not advocate for or against Hamas. Rather, in a series of rich and probing conversations with leading experts, it aims to deepen understanding of a movement that is a key player in the current crisis.
“It looks at, among other things, Hamas’s critical shift from social and religious activism to national political engagement; the delicate balance between Hamas’s political and military wings and its transformation from early anti-Jewish tendencies to a stance that differentiates between Judaism and Zionism.”
Publishers OR Books also include gushing praise from Professor of International Relations at the LSE, Fawaz A. Gerges, in its promotional material ahead of the book’s release.
“Makes the case for engaging the movement as opposed to trying to ostracise it and destroy it,” the LSE professor says of the book.
Author Cobban’s social media feed on X also confirms how she retweeted a post last weekend from Irish comic Tadhg Hickey who claimed to have attended the funeral of the late Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah with “all the best freedom fighters”.
Days earlier, on 23 February, Cobban also retweeted another post from Hickey, which saw him photographed with his “hero” Leila Khaled, who took part in the infamous 1969 plane hijacking as a member of the PFLP terror group.
In response to the confirmation that the Bibas family had been murdered in Gaza, Cobban also shared a post claiming it is “racist and a form of genocide whitewashing to act like two dead Israeli children is earth shattering news while actively ignoring or justifying the 20,000+ Palestinian children.”
Rami G. Khouri is a director of the Issam Fares Institute for Public Policy and International Affairs at the American University of Beirut.
A regular contributer to Al Jazeera, last week he wrote:”Effective Israeli propaganda has long demonised Hamas in the West as a reckless and vicious terror group that wants to destroy Israel. The reality, however, is that Hamas has been a successful Palestinian national political organisation.”
The launch event is chaired by Michael Mason, from LSE’s Middle East Centre, while other speakers include the Centre’s Jeroen Gunning, and Catherine Charrett of the University of Westminster.
Days after the Oct 7 massacre, Gunning told an event:”If you reduce Hamas to a gang of irrational terrorists, you will never understand why this is happening.”
He also claimed:”Normal life does not exist in Gaza. The population are in a de facto open-air prison.”
In June 2024, Charrett shared a post on X which stated: “Zionists can’t get over the fact that Zionism did not originate among the indigenous Jewish communities of the Middle East. ”
Last May, Mason, who chairs the book launch, posted on X: “It is impossible to understand the current global wave of student protests and other Palestinian solidarity gatherings without understanding at least the basics of the 1948 Nakba.”
An LSE spokesperson added: “We host an enormous number of events each year, covering a wide range of viewpoints and positions.
“We have clear policies in place to ensure the facilitation of debates in these events and enable all members of our community to refute ideas lawfully and to protect individual’s rights to freedom of expression within the law. This is formalised in our Code of Practice on Free Speech and in our Ethics Code.”
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