Hard line right wing Israelis started funding Hamas because towards the end of the leadership of Arafat, Palestine was much more willing to adopt a two state solution, and it would have been awkward for Israel to be asked “if these ‘terrorists’ are willing to compromise, why aren’t you?”
So they helped Hamas rise.
People like to point to “from the river (Jordan) to the (Red) sea” as “evidence” that Palestinians hate the Jewish people, but that ignores that that phrase was literally the election campaign for Likud (Netanyahu) in the 1970s and formed the back bone of the Israeli rights policy to this day.
Also, Hamas is less than 40,000 people in a country of 3 million, so generalizations aren’t helpful.
People also like to forget that Likud was itself born from a terrorist organization, Irgun, whose leader, a proscribed terrorist by several Western countries, was elected Prime Minister of Israel.
So they helped Hamas rise.
People like to point to “from the river (Jordan) to the (Red) sea” as “evidence” that Palestinians hate the Jewish people, but that ignores that that phrase was literally the election campaign for Likud (Netanyahu) in the 1970s and formed the back bone of the Israeli rights policy to this day.
Also, Hamas is less than 40,000 people in a country of 3 million, so generalizations aren’t helpful.