The European Union’s top court ruled on Wednesday that Hamas is a terrorist organization, rejecting a 2014 decision by a lower court.

The ruling by the European Court of Justice (ECJ) against the Gaza-based terror group was unexpected, as Eleanor Sharpston—an advocate general of the court—had argued that the General Court was right to delist Hamas in 2014, The Times of Israel reported. Usually the ECJ follows the advice of its lawyers.

The ECJ found that the General Court’s 2014 ruling was based on “an error of law.”

“With regard to Hamas, the Court observes that the General Court annulled the continued freezing of funds solely on the ground that the Council had not referred, by way of justification, to national decisions by competent authorities,” the ECJ said in a statement. However, the “national decisions” cited by the General Court applied only to the initial listing of a terrorist group on the list, not for keeping it there. Hamas has been on the EU’s list of terrorist organizations since it was first created in 2001.

1/ We welcome the ECJ ruling which confirmed the legality of Hamas listing in 2010-2014 (the ruling did not concern current listing)

— EU in Israel (@EUinIsrael) July 26, 2017

2/ The EU continues to consider Hamas a terrorist organisation; measures restricting its activity remain in force

— EU in Israel (@EUinIsrael) July 26, 2017

Hamas first appealed its placement on the EU’s terrorism list in 2010. When ruling in favor of the Islamist group, the General Court argued that Hamas was placed on the list “not on acts examined and confirmed in decisions of competent authorities but on factual imputations derived from the press and the internet.”

The decision was immediately appealed by the EU Council, resulting in Wednesday’s ruling.

“We welcome the fact that the ECJ has upheld the EU Council’s appeal and set aside the judgment of the General Court concerning the listing of Hamas from 2010 to 2014. The EJC has thus confirmed the legality of those listings,” said Lars Faaborg-Andersen, the EU’s ambassador to Israel. He added that the ruling only affected Hamas’ status for the years 2010 to 2014.

The ECJ’s ruling means that the General Court must revisit its decision. In the meantime, Hamas will remain blacklisted by the EU.

In 2013, the European Union designated only Hezbollah’s military apparatus as a terrorist organization, despite the admission of a Hezbollah spokesman that the group has a unified leadership and no separate wings of the organization.

Earlier this year, Hamas released a political document in an effort to moderate its image. However, the document did not replace the group’s 1988 charter, which explicitly calls for Israel’s destruction and violence against Jews worldwide.

Matthew Levitt and Maxine Rich of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy described the document as an attempt by Hamas “at widening its international appeal at a time when the group faces multiple challenges.”

While the paper “distances Hamas from the Muslim Brotherhood, and may include some acknowledgment of the 1967 armistice lines for the Six Day War as the basis for a deal with Israel,” it “still includes less friendly sections, including a rededication to armed resistance to liberate all of Palestine, ‘from the Jordan River eastward to the Mediterranean Sea in the west,’” Levitt and Rich noted.

In May, Mahmoud al-Zahar, a top Hamas official, emphasized that the terror group was still committed to “resistance” in order “to liberate the rest of Palestine and the territories of 1948,″ with “no negotiations.”

Hamas continues to prepare for its next war with Israel.

In April, an IDF unit that monitors the border with Gaza told The Times of Israel that it observed Hamas “rearming on every level on the sea-front — systems, weapons and trainings.” In March, it was reported that Hamas had developed powerful new rockets that could threaten Israeli border towns.

A senior IDF official told Israel’s Channel 2 in February that Hamas has rebuilt its tunnel infrastructure and rocket arsenal to the levels it maintained before its 2014 war against Israel.

Hamas spends some $40 million of its $100 million military budget on tunnel construction, according to Israeli and Palestinian sources. An Israeli official estimated last July that Hamas digs some six miles of tunnels every month.

Palestinian affairs correspondent Khaled Abu Toameh pointed out last year that Hamas has prioritized developing its military infrastructure over rebuilding Gazan homes, writing that “the last thing Hamas cares about is the welfare of the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.”

Gen. Yossi Kuperwasser, formerly the head of the research division of Israeli military intelligence and later the director general of the Ministry of Strategic Affairs, told reporters last May that Hamas is investing “a lot in making the necessary preparations so that in the next round, when they decide to start it, they will be able to inflict the heaviest damage on Israel.”

[Photo: katarina_dzurekova / YouTube ]