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After 29 days of fighting during Operation Protective Edge, both sides — Israel and Hamas — declared victory.
Hamas boasted the victory of the "resistance" — muqawwamah. The first to congratulate the organization was senior Hamas official Ismail Haniyeh, who on Aug. 5 released a recorded message but has yet to be seen in public. Other Hamas spokespersons — Khalil al-Hayya, whose son was killed during the operation and who has just left the bunker, and Sami Abu Zuhri who, throughout the fighting, gave interviews to the media from a compound at Al-Shifa Hospital — claimed that Israel was defeated by the resistance. Once again, they claimed, the resistance succeeded in defending the Palestinian people.
