The CCP-Mideast Terror Connection
Why do we know so perilously little about it?
By Clare Lopez
It’s long been known that the Soviet Union was deeply involved in collaboration with and training of Middle Eastern Islamic terror groups, like the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO).
Much of this was learned from Ion Mihai Pacepa, former chief of the Foreign Intelligence Service of Romania, who defected to the U.S. in 1978, when he walked into the U.S. Embassy in Bonn, West Germany.
The “Mitrokhin Files” added even more information about Russian sponsorship of Islamic terror. Vasiliy Mitrokhin was a KGB archivist who defected to the West in 1992, bringing out with him a treasure trove of secret documents.
Far less, however, is known about connections between the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and Middle East Islamic terror leaders. Mohammed Deif is Hamas’ top military commander in the Gaza Strip; he heads the Izzedine al-Qassam Brigades. He is currently one of the most hunted men on earth, as Israeli commandos search for those responsible for the horrific October 7 attack against Israel that targeted, raped, abused, killed and mutilated over 1,400 Israelis and nationals of other countries as well.
In addition to state-of-the-art weapons technology and possible assistance with an onslaught of cyberattacks against Israel, China reportedly also played a role in the education of Mohammed Deif.
According to reporting from Chinese dissident journalist Lu De, human rights activist and reporter Jennifer Zeng, the New York Post, and secret documents obtained by the Lude Media network, the PLO sent Mohammed Deif to China in 1996 where he was enrolled in the People’s Liberation Army (PLA)’s Ordnance Engineering College in Shijiazhuang, China.
There he studied Artillery Technology. The CCP even provided Deif with a Chinese wife in 1998; she is a Dongxiang Muslim from China’s northwest province of Gansi, and their wedding was attended by officials of the CCP’s International Liaison Department.
A nurse, she was Deif’s third wife and also interpreter for Deif and the PLO in China at the time. The pair returned to Gaza in 2000. Although Deif and his Chinese wife reportedly lost contact with the CCP after the 9/11 attacks, she reached out to the CCP in 2006, seeking to re-establish ties.
After suffering the loss of one leg in an Israeli air strike in 2014 that killed another of Deif’s wives and two children, she returned to China in 2015 to obtain a prosthetic leg before coming back to Gaza once again in 2019. She is reported to have maintained direct ties to Chinese President Xi Jinping ever since, providing an ongoing Hamas conduit for communications with Beijing.
At latest count, 32 Americans were murdered in the October 7 Hamas attack against Israel. More than 1,400 Israelis and some 61 nationals of other countries were also murdered. Over 200, including Americans, are believed to be hostages of Hamas.
In close collaboration with the Iranian regime and other Hamas leaders, Mohammed Deif was the military mastermind of these attacks. And in perfect synchrony with Gazan and other Islamic media sources, the Chinese media, including social media, began spewing out incendiary antisemitic, anti-Israel invective almost immediately, claiming that Israel was carrying out indiscriminate attacks against Gazan civilians.
It is clear for all to see at this point that the CCP operates in close partnership with Iran, Russia and Islamic terror groups like Hamas against the U.S. and our ally, the Jewish State of Israel.
While the Biden administration has expressed staunch support for Israel — and is delivering a steady stream of needed humanitarian and military assistance to it — President Joe Biden and Secretary of State Antony Blinken must also forthrightly call out the regimes in both Iran and China for their collaboration in the worst attack against the Jewish people since the Holocaust.
Clare M. Lopez is the Founder/President of Lopez Liberty LLC.