With reports and images of famine in Gaza coming to widespread global attention, condemnation of Israel’s military campaign continues to grow. Yet it is also apparent that amid the great suffering of Gaza’s people, Hamas has no ‘victory’ to speak of, even in the eyes of many who initially endorsed the ‘al-Aqsa Flood’ operation launched by Hamas on 7 October 2023.
The message below, composed by Yahya al-Farghali (an Egyptian jihadist cleric who used to be a prominent figure in Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham, but subsequently left the group and is still based in northwest Syria), is an example of this sentiment.
For Farghali, the solution to Hamas’ woes is to abandon its appeals to non-Islamic concepts of human rights and democracy and fight on the basis of jihad against disbelief, not on the basis of Palestinian or Arab nationalism.
To be sure, the title of his message about ‘raising the white flag’, which might initially suggest to a Western reader that he is calling on Hamas to surrender, is somewhat misleading. While Farghali thought that al-Aqsa Flood was important in stemming the tide of normalisation of relations between Israel and Arab states, in his view the problem is that Hamas has deviated from pure Islamic values by appealing to conventional concepts of human rights and democracy in the international system and that its justifications for doing so are invalid.
Incidentally, the mention of “taqiyya” (“dissimulation”) as a concept here is of some note. Contrary to what is sometimes asserted, taqiyya is not simply a Shia concept where one can dissimulate about one’s religion to shield against persecution. Some Islamists and jihadists do in fact debate whether rulers can present a seemingly less ‘Islamic face’ to outsiders on the basis of taqiyya. For Farghali, this behaviour is not acceptable if it misleads people from Islam, even on grounds of “compulsion.”
For Farghali, the solution to Hamas’ woes is to abandon its appeals to non-Islamic concepts of human rights and democracy and fight on the basis of jihad against disbelief, not on the basis of Palestinian or Arab nationalism. Farghali’s essay is a useful reminder of the gap that exists between Hamas and jihadists who uphold ideological purity.
Below is the essay translated.
To Hamas: raise the white flag as a mercy to the people
In the name of God, and praise be to God and prayers and peace be upon the Messenger of God:
To Hamas: raise the white flag as a mercy to the people
Initially, I was among the staunchest supporters of the blessed al-Aqsa Flood, as I acknowledged its great virtues, the most important of them being the breaking of the ‘slide’ of normalisation that was ridden by those who betrayed the Ummah, as through it they fell with hateful hastiness towards the depth of betrayal and the mud of selling the Palestinian cause and the holy al-Aqsa Mosque.
And here you have tried wearing the clothing of identification with international concepts of democracy and human rights etc. which do not concord with our religion but rather contradict it.
Even if from its first day I felt that the greatest issue with the Flood’s plan was that you thought well of the Islamic world’s ruling systems and their position towards you or let us say you did not realise the degree of submissiveness and collaboration they have reached, which you have been seeing with your eyes from the first day and which you have become more certain of day after day, you nonetheless rely on the fact that your Prophet (SAWS)- who does not speak out of arbitrary whims—gave you glad tidings that the one who forsakes you will not harm you. These are true, actual glad tidings, and the greatest of them is the words of your Lord (Almighty and Exalted is He): “If you support God, He will support you and plant firm your feet”; as well as the Almighty’s words: “And indeed Our soldiers are those who overcome”—and other verses and lines of evidence are numerous.
Thus, the custom of the just mujahidin among the Ummah—since the time of the rightly-guided caliphs (God be pleased with them all) until this day of ours—is that they should consider their shortcoming and acts of disobedience when the victory is missing or delayed, and it is what our Lord has guided us to when He informed the Muslims regarding the Uhud expedition—despite the big difference between them and their enemy in number and equipment—that the lack of victory was because of the act of disobedience and nothing else besides it: “God has been true to His promise to you as you perceive it by His permission, except when you fail and disagree with each other and commit disobedience, after He has made you see what you love.” And He informed them that the defeat of the Muslim army was because of the split of their forces and not because of the enemy’s power, however strong it was: “Or when a tragedy struck you, you came upon two like it, and you said: How is this so? Say: it is from yourselves. Indeed God is capable over everything.”
And here you have tried wearing the clothing of identification with international concepts of democracy and human rights etc. which do not concord with our religion but rather contradict it, and you have justified this on the grounds of necessity and taqiyya etc.: “And it is what is not allowed for a leader in the Ummah, because he misleads the people, and there is no justification of compulsion in causing people to go astray, for the interest of the religion and its concepts are to be preferred over life by consensus.” So this has not benefited you at all.
For with regards to these idols of date paste that are made by the West and its international community: the condition for their endurance and the requirement for their sanctification is that they should not harm the West’s material interests, nor the interest of its bastard child in what they call the Middle East.
As soon as these interests are harmed, they eat their idols without regret or justification, feeling proud that they have deceived the naïve through them such that they brought them to perdition.
You should declare it in a resounding way, as a holy jihad to defeat disbelief because it is disbelief, not because it is colonialism, settlement or a matter of right to self-determination, etc.
Has the time not come for you to raise the pure white flag that only bears the two shahadas just as the Taliban raised them and thus God granted them conquest, despite the fact that those located in countries next to them to the west and east conspired against them and those near and far forsook them, and despite the fact that they are not in the land of al-Sham, whose people are conveyed glad tidings of victory and supremacy over their enemy by the one who does not speak on the basis of arbitrary whims (SAWS)?
I think you well understand that I don’t mean the ragged banner, but rather the goal. He (SAWS) said: “Whoever fights under a blind banner, becomes enraged for a partisan group, or calls to a partisan group, or supports a partisan group and is killed, dies a Jahiliya death”- narrated by Muslim.
So you should have no objective internally or externally except making God’s word supreme and implementing the rule of His law, and you should declare it in a resounding way, as a holy jihad to defeat disbelief because it is disbelief, not because it is colonialism, settlement or a matter of right to self-determination etc. And implementing the rule of the law is to implement it in its entirety so far as you can do so, and you should call all the people to heed their obligation that God has enjoined upon them and their Prophet (SAWS) has enjoined upon them: to join the convoy of this holy jihad, far removed from slogans of patriotism, Arab nationalism and the like.
Indeed I am a trustworthy advisor to you—by God and for God’s sake- I swear without perjury—that if you do this sincerely—before it’s too late—then the victory will come upon you, with deliverance for you and your beleaguered people—in fulfilment of the words of your Lord and in fulfilment of the promise of your Prophet (SAWS).
I wish you well and advise you for the sake of God
Yahya al-Farghali
Idlib al-Izz 27 Muharram 1447 AH [22 July 2025]
NB: The foregoing does not negate the obligation to support Muslims in Gaza with body and wealth now- sooner rather than latter—in so far as the Muslim can do so.
Published originally on July 26, 2025.
