The Hebrew letter Chet does indeed correspond to the Arabic letter ح which makes the hard H sound. Since most Hebrew speakers cannot pronounce it, the closest sound to them is KH (also represented by the letter Kuf, Arabic equivalent is خ), thus when they try to pronounce "Hamas", they end up saying "KHAMASSS". And no, Chet is not the only Hebrew letter affected by a sound change like this, but it's the relevant one because it's used in the Hebrew spelling of "Hamas".

Hope that makes it make more sense.

[–] Kusimulkku@lemm.ee 5 points 2 months ago (1 children)

This was helpful, thanks

[–] Resol@lemmy.world 3 points 2 months ago

You're welcome.

[–] meowMix2525@lemm.ee 9 points 2 months ago (1 children)

The k makes it sound more islamic and triggers western audience's latent islamophobia

[–] Darkenfolk@dormi.zone 3 points 2 months ago (1 children)

The k makes it sound more islamic and triggers western audience's latent islamophobia

With all due respect, I don't think it's the K-sound that triggers the "western audience's latent islamophobia".

That probably has more to do with the news from England and Germany.

[–] meowMix2525@lemm.ee 1 points 2 months ago

What news from England and Germany? The k thing (pronouncing the H in Hamas with a harsh hissing sound common in both Hebrew and Arabic but completely absent in English and other western languages) has been around at least since Oct. 7, probably much longer before that. It's a dog whistle. At best, it's in the spirit of mocking their language.

[–] kibiz0r@midwest.social 9 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Do you condemn KHHAAMAS?

[–] morrowind@lemmy.ml 5 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Here's this guys original YouTube channel, he has a bunch more excellent satire on the topic: https://youtube.com/@mrtadhghickey?si=uW0CbHYK5kika4aU

[–] Viking_Hippie@lemmy.world 3 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

Yay, it's "Taydgehae" from that great episode of Bad Hasbara! 😁❤️

(Yes, I know he's in more than one, but I started from the beginning and I'm not caught up yet)

[–] funkless_eck@sh.itjust.works 1 points 2 months ago

I didn't sleep well. I was trying to work out if it was like Christmas for Cars

[–] ulterno@lemmy.kde.social -3 points 2 months ago

It's probably just an alternate pronunciation.

Considering that country names are different in different languages, I don't see much of a problem with it.

If the last sentence made you go "?" Check the

Chinese language name for China
Japanese name for Japan
Indian language names for India
But also what China, Japan and India have names for other countries and even alternate names for historical personalities in their languages. In some cases, even regional languages will have other alternate names.