How far will you make it through this? Take the Hamdan Test!

"The question is," CNN's Jim Sciutto asked repeatedly, "does Hamas accept some responsibility for civilian deaths in Gaza?" Hamas politburo member Osama Hamdan doesn't like the question and angrily tries to filibuster the interview. At one point, Hamdan accuses Sciutto of looking through "Israeli eyes" and "Israeli ears," which almost seems to amuse Sciutto.

In case you're wondering, the answer to Sciutto's question appears to be no, although Hamdan's unhinged rant never directly answers it. He spends most of the five-plus minutes accusing Sciutto of only wanting to "listen to yourself" while filibustering, which is an amusing case of projection.

And then Hamdan hung up, which prompts a question: why did he bother to do the interview in the first place?

I pressed senior Hamas official Osama Hamdan on whether Hamas accepts any responsibility for the loss of civilian life in Gaza, which residents have told CNN they believe it does. He wouldn’t answer and instead took me on a history lesson of events he didn’t know I witnessed… pic.twitter.com/L3UUzHrVPb

— Jim Sciutto (@jimsciutto) August 17, 2024

The Times of Israel picked up the clip, and posits that Hamdan was trying to avoid having to answer criticisms from Palestinians:

Hamas politburo member Osama Hamdan abruptly ended a CNN interview Saturday after correspondent Jim Sciutto asked him if the terror group accepts responsibility for the deaths of Palestinian civilians due to its use of civilian infrastructure in the war sparked by its October 7 onslaught.

Before Hamdan shut down the conversation, Sciutto tried, unsuccessfully, to get the Doha-based representative to respond to quotes from Palestinians in Gaza blaming Hamas for the destruction there.

Kudos to Sciutto for keeping his cool and parrying back against Hamdan's lies. Give him another kudo or two for not laughing out loud at the "Israeli eyes/ears" crack, although I could swear that I saw a grin flash at that. 

Speaking of which, doesn't Hamas frown on the use of the word "Israel" and its variants? Isn't that akin to recognition of Israel as a state and Israelis as its legitimate citizens? Normally they use "occupiers" and "Zionists" as euphemisms to avoid any such recognition. 

Anyway. Hamdan won't answer that because he can't answer it. Despite all of the bloviating Hamdan does, he can't refute that Hamas broke a cease-fire in place since May 2021 on October 7 and started a war. He's just angry that Hamas is losing it as badly as it is, and that the world hasn't intervened like it usually does to rescue Hamas. The lesson here is simple: Don't start wars if you don't want your turf destroyed by a superior army. 

Oh, and don't do interviews if you don't like getting asked questions about starting wars against superior armies. 

Side note: What the deuce are "Israeli eyes"? I'm thinking that a remake of this classic New Wave song may be in order.

He'll take a tumble on you
Roll you like you were dice
Until you come out a fool
He's got those Israeli eyes ...

Call Jim Sciutto. I think we have a hit on our hands!