SINGAPORE – Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim’s vocal support for the Palestinian cause could blow back on Malaysia as the United States tables legislation to sever funding for Hamas and other Palestinian militant groups through economic and financial sanctions on their foreign supporters.
Anwar’s administration has played up its resistance to US and Western pressure to review its stance on Hamas, which Malaysia has refused to condemn or label as a terrorist organization.
Malaysian police, meanwhile, have warned of possible economic sabotage, espionage and even security threats to the premier allegedly emanating from Israel’s intelligence agency Mossad.
The Muslim-majority nation has long stood in solidarity with Palestine and long rejected diplomatic relations with Israel even as certain Arab nations have recently pursued normalization with Tel Aviv.
Putrajaya views Hamas as the legitimately elected government of Gaza, according to Anwar, owing to its victory at 2006 parliamentary polls. Hamas members are known to reside in Malaysia to work or attend university and have been alleged targets of Israel’s spy agency.
But Anwar’s unflinching stance is just as much about local politics as he seeks to curry favor with Muslim ethnic Malays who represent a national majority and are thus crucial to his government’s survival and potential re-election.
Analysts say the premier cannot afford to be seen as equivocating on the plight of the Palestinians at a moment when his nearly year-old administration has lost electoral ground to the pro-Islamist Perikatan Nasional (PN) coalition.
Both Anwar’s multiracial government and the conservative opposition bloc have recently staged competing mega-rallies denouncing Israel’s bombardments of Gaza.
“There is a strong domestic imperative for the prime minister to support the Palestinian cause,” said Mustafa Izzuddin, a senior international affairs analyst at consultancy firm Solaris Strategies Singapore.
Anwar seeks to “portray himself as a strong and principled statesman in the eyes of the domestic populace by not bowing to American political pressure,” he said.
Addressing parliament late last month, Anwar said the US Embassy had issued three demarche notes as a “warning” to Malaysia to review its informal ties with Hamas after killed civilians and took hostages in an October 7 surprise attack on Israel. “I said that we, as a policy, have a relationship with Hamas from before and this will continue,” the premier told the legislature.
Photo: The Jerusalem Post / Twitter
Critics have accused Anwar of grandstanding by claiming he was “threatened” by the West for speaking up for Palestinian rights. “I was criticized and some even attacked me from Europe, the United States and certainly Israel,” said Anwar at a rally in Kuala Lumpur on October 24. “Don’t even think of threatening us… we are with the Palestinians in their struggle.”
Dennis Ignatius, a former Malaysian diplomat and author, said that while Anwar is “absolutely right to speak out in the strongest possible terms”, Gaza’s violence “shouldn’t be an occasion for politicians to preen their feathers or embellish their credentials. Or worse still, to pretend to be heroes for standing up to the West on behalf of Palestine.
“There has also been much brouhaha over the demarches the US has made in connection with Malaysia’s stand on the issue. It is being made out to be something sinister and unusual; in fact, it is part of the normal diplomatic representation that nations make to each other on important issues,” Ignatius, a former ambassador to Chile and Argentina, wrote in a recent commentary.
Anwar’s government says it is monitoring the passage of the US legislation, known as the Hamas International Financing Prevention Act, which will likely enter force after a Senate vote.
Once enacted, the law would allow for the imposition of sanctions against foreigners who knowingly provide “significant” financial, material or technological support to Hamas or the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, an Islamist paramilitary group active in Gaza and the West Bank.
The law would also require the US president to devise a list of nations and individuals that provide such support to Palestinian militant groups for the purpose of imposing sanctions.
Analysts say Malaysia is not likely to be targeted by the law since it is not known to have ever provided arms or ammunition to Hamas and that the government’s verbal support for Hamas’ political struggle would not warrant sanctions.
Putrajaya has been accused of hosting a de facto Hamas embassy in the form of an apparently apolitical cultural office, the Palestinian Cultural Organization Malaysia (PCOM), an accusation it denies. The organization has been accused of propagating Hamas’ messaging and maintaining ties to its leaders.
Malaysia maintains direct communication channels with Hamas, which violently wrested full control of Gaza in 2007 and is designated as a terrorist group by the US, European Union and others.
Former Malaysian premier Najib Razak visited Gaza on a humanitarian mission in 2013, where he was received by Hamas’ political bureau head Ismail Haniyeh, who later met with then-premier Mahathir Mohamad in Kuala Lumpur in 2020.
Malaysia’s Foreign Affairs Ministry manages a humanitarian trust fund for Palestine dedicated to medical aid, food and basic necessities in Gaza and for any Palestinians affected by the war, according to Anwar, who has ruled out any military aid. The fund is reportedly approaching its target of collecting 100 million ringgit (US$21.2 million).
“It is unlikely Malaysia will be sanctioned for not labeling Hamas a terrorist group, as there also other countries, including allies of the US, which have also not labeled Hamas as a terrorist group so why should Malaysia be compelled to do so,” Mustafa told Asia Times. “Malaysia is therefore assuming a principled position of not being externally interfered in its domestic affairs.”
Malaysia’s foreign policy has always been guided by economic pragmatism. Now, some suggest Anwar’s defiant stance could undermine his government’s drive to attract new US investment as more American firms leave China for Southeast Asia. Anwar has acknowledged that the newly proposed US law could impact bilateral investment and trade, which the US Embassy in Malaysia estimates at US$1.6 trillion annually.
“Any sanctions against Malaysia can also affect the assessment of the US government and US companies towards Malaysia, as well as affect US companies’ investment opportunities in Malaysia,” said Anwar in a written reply to parliament on November 7. The Southeast Asian nation has said it will “not recognize” the validity of any unilateral sanctions imposed under the proposed US law.
Julia Lau and Francis E Hutchinson, senior fellows at Singapore’s ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute think tank, wrote in a commentary that “some finesse is needed to ensure that foreign sentiment vis-a-vis Malaysia is not spooked, although Western leaders would understand that Anwar must allow some space for his fellow citizens to vent their feelings.”
Apart from staging massive pro-Palestinian street protests, Malaysians have boycotted American food franchises and international brands that are perceived as linked to or siding with Israel. They include McDonald’s, Burger King, Starbucks, KFC, Coca-Cola and Nestle, with local gig workers reportedly bearing the brunt of reduced sales.
Lau and Hutchinson added that while a strong pro-Palestinian stance is politically expedient, Malaysia’s economy depends on foreign direct investment and trade. As such, “the prime minister will need to draw on his fabled oratorical skills, backing them with nimble diplomacy, in the weeks ahead.”
While the US may feel slighted over Malaysia’s stance on Hamas, it still recognizes the country’s leverage in the Muslim world. Anwar has said Washington called on his administration to “urge a country to not take advantage of the conflict by using a proxy to get involved in the Gaza conflict,” without specifying the nation but likely a reference to Iran and its backed Hezbollah militant group in Lebanon.
In late October, Anwar traveled to Saudi Arabia where he had a private meeting with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, whose country was weighing formal ties with Israel before the October 7 assault. Anwar also traveled to Egypt and Turkey in a bid to shore up support for Palestinians, which appears to have yielded few tangible results.
“Anwar’s statesmanship has limited influence as he is dealing with a divided Middle East underpinned by geopolitical complexities and Malaysia has no diplomatic relations with Israel, thereby hampering its ability [to bring] about a ceasefire and humanitarian relief to those affected by the current conflict escalation,” said Mustafa.
Over 11,000 Palestinians have reportedly been killed in Israel’s bombardment of Gaza in retaliation for Hamas’ rampage on southern Israel in which at least 1,200 Israelis died.
Tel Aviv has vowed to end Hamas’ rule over Gaza and has served notice that it intends to seek and kill Hamas operatives abroad, a threat that has raised antennae in Putrajaya given past cases of Palestinians being targeted while on Malaysian soil.
Razarudin Husain, the country’s Inspector General of Police, all but acknowledged Mossad’s presence in the country in a November 1 press conference. The police, he said, are working to detect foreign intelligence operatives conducting clandestine operations involving local recruits. “We suspect Israelis may have infiltrated the country using foreign passports for their operations,” said the IGP.
He cited the drive-by shooting and assassination of Palestinian lecturer Fadi al-Batsh, an electrical engineer said to be a drone expert and member of Hamas, in Kuala Lumpur in 2018 and the case of two Palestinian computer programmers believed to be operatives of Hamas’ al-Qassam Brigade who were targets of a snatch-and-grab kidnapping linked to Mossad reported by local media last year. The Israeli spy agency has denied involvement in both incidents.
The police chief has insisted that alleged threats against Anwar not be taken lightly or derided as political maneuvering, saying the premier has been advised to limit his public appearances and travel with more bodyguards.
“If a software scientist for Hamas can be a target, our prime minister is more of a risk. I am convinced that there is a threat either to his life, to our economy or others,” Razarudin said.
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