Is Hamas a terrorist organization?

Prominent Islamic leaders, like the imam fronting the Ground Zero Mosque, have a difficult time answering straightforward questions such as: Is Hamas a terrorist organization? Even if they can deal with that not very difficult question, they tend to stumble over this one: Does Israel have a right to exist? As a Jewish state?
Andrew McCarthy explains why these questions tend to stump Islamic leaders when speaking to Western journalists. McCarthy’s column demonstrates in some detail that the United States has been penetrated by followers of the Muslim Brotherhood seeking to expand the realm of Islam. As the Communists had their useful idiots (thank you, Mona Charen), the Islamists have theirs. Among them is New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who adds disgrace (thank you, Debra Burlingame) to idiocy.
The occasion of McCarthy’s column was his appearance on David Asman’s Fox Business Channel show debating Imam Dawoud Kringle of the New York State prison system, a supporter of the Ground Zero Mosque. McCarthy commented on his close encounter with Mr. Kringle: “Kringle…reeled off the usual talking points about how Islam forbids terrorism and, therefore, if someone commits an act of terrorism that act is, by definition, un-Islamic.”
That’s beautiful. But when Asman then posed the question whether Hamas is a terrorist organization, Kringle froze up and looked like his life flashed before his eyes.