Head of Hamas’s political bureau Ismail Haneyya has affirmed that “the Zionist enemy has no future on the Palestinian land” and that “Palestine will remain alive in the conscience of the [Palestinian] people and the Arab and Muslim nations.”Haneyya said in an interview with Al-Jazeera TV on Sunday evening that "there is no way other than the return of the Palestinians to their homeland and the villages from which they were expelled."
Iranian and Arab media have stories like this all the time. The most popular version is Iran's countdown clock for Israel's destruction, which is supposed to happen around 2040.
Who is their audience?
It isn't like Israelis are biting their nails and hiding in bomb shelters every time some terrorist says Israel is going to be destroyed.
The audience is clearly the Arab and Muslim world. And the underlying message is one that is quite positive for Israel!
As with everything else in the Middle East, one needs to look at this through the lens of the honor/shame culture. In this case, there is also the "strong horse" element.
Israel is strong. It is a regional superpower. It is officially at peace with a number of Muslim-majority and Arab countries, and has a tacit peace with many others.
Iran and Hamas and the others want the Muslim and Arab world to stop being friendly with Israel, so they are trying to convince them that relations with Israel is a losing proposition - and when Israel fails, they won't have any friends in the Muslim world. They want the Muslim world to think of Israel as weak, so they do not want to ally with the region's "strong horse."
The stream of articles forecasting Israel's imminent demise are a desperate attempt to convince Muslims not to believe their own eyes. They want to put doubt in nations that might be considering opening relations with Israel.
Every time Iran or terror supporters predict Israel's destruction, it shows that they are losing.
