Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal addressed Qatar’s 17th Al Jazeera Forum on Sunday, at a conference that focused heavily on denigrating Israel, while featuring senior officials from Iran and Somalia.

Mashaal applauded the group’s Oct. 7, 2023, attacks on Israel as having “brought the Palestinian cause back to the forefront of the world” and said that Palestinians “take pride” in “resistance,” a euphemism for violence against Israelis. He called to “pursue Israel and establish that it is a pariah entity that is losing its international legitimacy,” noting the “changes in the elites, universities and social networks” against Israel. 

The Hamas leader, who resides in Doha, also hailed Qatar’s “honorable role in the [Palestinian] cause.” 

Hamas is designated by the U.S., European Union and other countries as a terrorist organization, and Mashaal is wanted in the U.S. for terrorism, murder conspiracy and sanctions evasion relating to his role in planning the Oct. 7 attacks. 

Mashaal was listed on the conference’s program and list of speakers in versions of the Al Jazeera Forum website archived by independent researcher Eitan Fischberger, but as of Sunday Mashaal was no longer listed. At the same time, the Al Jazeera Forum X account extensively promoted Mashaal, with 19 posts about the terror leader’s remarks. The account featured two posts about conference keynote speaker Abbas Araghchi, the foreign minister of Iran. 

This year’s Al Jazeera Forum theme is “the Palestinian cause and the regional balance of power in the context of an emerging multipolar world.” The conference website  suggests that Israel committed a “genocide in Gaza,” and that Israel “has sought to reoccupy Gaza … or establish settlements in it.” It also argues that Israel faces strategic setbacks as a result. 

The speakers’ remarks reflected the forum’s hostile position on Israel.

Araghchi lamented a double standard toward “Israeli expansionism,” arguing that “other countries are demanded to disarm, pressured to reduce defensive capacity, punished for scientific advancement … This is not arms control, not non-proliferation, not security. It is enforcement of permanent inequality. Israel must have a military and strategic edge and others must remain vulnerable.”

Araghchi, speaking a day after he led his country’s negotiations with the U.S. in Oman on dismantling its nuclear program, said that it has an “inalienable right to enrich uranium.” 

The Iranian foreign minister also said that “Palestine is the defining question of justice … The strategic and moral compass of our region.” 

Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud floated the possibility of war with Israel in a pre-conference interview aired on Al Jazeera. He questioned why Israel would want to build a military base “in Somalia,” referring to reports of activity in Somaliland, whose sovereignty Israel recognized in December. He argued a base could only be offensive, ignoring repeated attacks by the Iran-backed Houthis, from nearby Yemen, on Israel.

“Israel is preparing or positioning itself to attack someone else,” he said. “We will fight in our capacity; we will defend ourselves, and that means that we will confront any Israeli forces coming in, because we are against that and we will never allow that.”

Another speaker was Francesca Albanese, the U.N. special rapporteur who has been sanctioned by the U.S. for “infringement on the sovereignty” of Israel and the U.S. by pursuing International Criminal Court prosecutions of citizens of both countries, as Secretary of State Marco Rubio described her actions last year. 

Albanese claimed in her remarks, delivered via video, that Israel had committed a premeditated genocide of Palestinians in Gaza, and that all of humanity “now has a common enemy” in Israel.