Just one in four British Muslims say Hamas was guilty of rape and murder on October 7

ONLY a quarter of British Muslims believe Hamas committed rape and murder on October 7, according to a poll exactly six months after the massacre.

Almost half (46 per cent) of British Muslims said they sympathise with Hamas, research commissioned by think-tank the Henry Jackson Society (HJS) showed.

Nearly 40 per cent of those polled thought Hamas did not commit atrocities, while 37 per cent said they didn’t know if they had.

Younger and well-educated Muslims were the most likely to deny the massacre, in which terrorists killed around 1,200 Israelis and took 253 people hostage — including 47 per cent of those aged 1 to 24 and 40 per cent of university graduates.

The survey posed questions of 1,000 British Muslims and a 2,013-strong sample of the public, including whether Hamas committed murder and rape on October 7; 24 per cent of British Muslims said they had, compared with 62 per cent of the public.

Fiyaz Mughal, founder of interfaith groups Tell Mama, Faith Matters and Muslims Against Anti-Semitism, said the findings were ‘shocking but also not shocking’. He said: ‘The sense that Hamas did not conduct massacres and rapes in Israel is atrocious because it shows a closed-off mentality to anything emanating from Israel.’

Alan Mendoza, executive director of HJS, said: ‘The Government needs to find a way of strengthening and supporting the voice of moderate Muslims and driving the extremist narrative to the sidelines.’

The poll also indicated that 46 per cent of British Muslims, and 16 per cent across the board, felt Jewish people have too much power over UK government policy, while 39 per cent of Muslims believe Jewish people have too much power over the country’s financial system.