Hamas

Summary

A group, listed by some countries as an international terrorist organization, that began as a spinoff of the Muslim Brotherhood, engaging in social work and political activity. Beginning in the 1990s, Hamas fought Israel as an insurgency, sending suicide bombers into buses and public markets. The group won a majority in Palestinian parliamentary elections in 2006 and began pursuing reconciliation with Fatah, its secular rival, which governs the West Bank. After seizing control of Gaza in 2007, Hamas operated as a government. Rocket attacks from Gaza into Israel drew significant reprisals in 2009 and 2012, but Hamas claimed victory and continued to gain popularity among Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza.

During the Arab Spring of the early 2010s, Hamas declined to support the embattled al-Assad regime in Syria, which, until then, had served as a haven for Hamas's leadership in exile. Leaving Syria and, thus, losing financial support from its ally Iran, Hamas sought new funding from the Gulf states through Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood. Reconciliation with Fatah was an initiative by Hamas's top leader, Khaled Meshal, whose power was challenged by the local leadership in Gaza. As war broke out between Hamas and Israel in late 2023, reports of reconciliation discussions between Hamas and Fatah remained ongoing.

Territory: Controls the Gaza Strip, has support among Palestinians in the West Bank.

Religious Orientation: Sunni Muslim fundamentalist.

Founded: 1987.

Stated Goals: Installation of an Islamist government in Palestine, including all territory of the state of Israel.

Key Leaders

• Ismail Abdel Salam Ahmed Haniyeh—political head of Hamas from 2017 to 2024.
• Yahya Sinwar—leader of Hamas inside the Gaza Strip since 2017.
• Khaled Meshal—political head of Hamas from 1996 to 2017. Succeeded founder Sheikh Ahmed Yassin and his successor Abdel Aziz Ali Abdul Majid al-Rantisi.
• Mohammed Deif—head of Hamas's al-Qassam Brigades from 2002 to 2024.
• Mousa Mohammed Abu Marzook—deputy political leader (1997–2014).

Alliances

Hamas describes itself as a branch of the Sunni fundamentalist Muslim Brotherhood. The Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades are the military arm of Hamas.

Key Events

• 1987: Founded with support from Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood. Provides medical and social welfare services to Palestinians.
• 1987–2004: Carries out scores of attacks against Israeli military and civilian targets using suicide bombers.
• 2004–05: Establishes political arm, wins seats in municipal elections in the West Bank and Gaza.
• 2006: Wins majority in Palestinian parliament and forms a government; insists it will not pursue peace talks with Israel. European Union and the United States cut off aid.
• 2007: Assumes control over Gaza after weeks of gun battles with rival secularist party Fatah.
• 2009: Survives as Israeli troops invade Gaza to halt rocket attacks. Declares victory.
• May 2011: Signs Cairo Agreement, calling for a unity government with Fatah and new elections.
• November 2012: Survives eight days of Israeli air strikes in Gaza. Launches rockets that reach the outskirts of Tel Aviv.
• January 2013: No apparent progress as Khaled Meshal and Fatah's Mahmoud Abbas, representing the Palestinian Authority, try to finalize the Cairo Agreement.
• 2014: Three Israeli teenagers disappear from the West Bank. Hamas is blamed for the disappearance and tensions between Israel and Hamas spike.
• 2018: Israel opens fire on 40,000 protesters on the border of Gaza. The situation escalates to rocket fire and air strikes between Israel and Hamas.
• 2021: In Jerusalem, Israeli police and Palestinian protesters clash, resulting in hundreds of injuries. Hamas retaliates with rockets aimed at Jerusalem. Israel responds with air strikes.
• 2023: Hamas militants cross the border into Israel, attacking multiple locations and killing some 1,200 Israelis, prompting the Israeli government to declare war on Hamas.
• 2024: Ismail Haniyeh and Mohammed Deif assassinated by Israel in separate strikes during the Israel-Hamas War.

Status

Hamas leaders emphasized a willingness to negotiate and reach a two-state solution throughout the 2010s, as seen in the 2017 Document of General Principles and Policies. Despite this posture of peace, the group exhibited intermittent violence, particularly in 2014, 2018, and 2021, and by 2023, Israeli-Palestinian tensions resulted in the deadliest year on record in the West Bank. On October 7, 2023, Hamas launched an air, land, and sea attack on Israel—a country with one of the best-funded and extensively trained intelligence services in the Middle East—catching the nation with its guard and defenses down. Israel then went to war against Hamas with the aim of destroying the organization.

The Palestinian Authority allowed Hamas to celebrate in the West Bank in 2012 on the anniversary of its founding. Hamas reciprocated the following month, allowing Fatah to celebrate in Gaza—an event that drew crowds of 200,000 to 500,000. Despite the gestures of goodwill, the two sides could not agree on how to implement the Cairo Agreement. According to news reports, a sticking point was that Hamas wanted to form a unity government to supervise elections. Fatah wanted to hold the elections first and then develop a government.

Hamas's top leader at the time, Khaled Meshal, was motivated to negotiate successfully and was willing to make concessions. Participation in a Palestinian Authority government would not only extend Hamas's influence to the West Bank, but it would also strengthen Meshal's position within Hamas. The leadership in Gaza has increased its power since Meshal and other top leaders had to leave Syria and scatter to different countries. The Gaza leadership has reason to resist reconciliation with the Palestinian Authority since they would be required to give up at least some control to the new unity government. According to reports, even under new leadership and amid heightened conflict with Israel, Hamas remained open to discussing reconciliation and unification with Fatah into the 2020s.

In-Depth Description

Origins and Years of Insurgency

In December 1987, cleric Sheikh Ahmed Yassin founded Hamas (an acronym of its official name, Harakat al-Muqāwamah al-ʾIslāmiyyah or Islamic Resistance Movement) in response to a popular uprising against Israeli occupation known as the intifada. Yassin had previously led al-Mujamma' al-Islami (the Islamic Center), an organization that coordinated political activities in Gaza on behalf of the Muslim Brotherhood. Hamas was a militia, charitable organization, and political party that rejected Israel's right to exist. Its charter was published in 1988, the same year that the leader of the secular Fatah party, Yasser Arafat (d. 2004), agreed to recognize Israel's right to exist in exchange for a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza. For the next two decades, Hamas persisted in its refusal to consider a "two-state solution" to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

The Hamas Covenant posits the organization's goal: "to raise the banner of Allah over every inch of Palestine." The covenant further declared, "Initiatives, and so-called peaceful solutions and international conferences, contradict the principles of the Islamic Resistance Movement. There is no solution for the Palestinian question except through jihad (struggle). Initiatives, proposals, and international conferences are all a waste of time and vain endeavors." Claiming "the Palestinian problem is a religious problem," Hamas introduced a new element into the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians, fundamentalist Islam, which was gaining traction elsewhere in the Muslim world at the same time.

Hamas's ideology brought with it several new tactics, notably suicide bombing. Palestinian militants were persuaded that dying for the cause would gain them immediate entrance to paradise. Families of suicide bombers received generous compensation. Hamas claimed responsibility for scores of attacks that took hundreds of lives, both military and civilian. These included sniper attacks, rocket and mortar attacks aimed at military installations and Jewish settlements, and suicide bombings in crowded spaces. Hamas pioneered the targeting of buses. It also recruited women (including mothers of young children) as suicide bombers.

Yassin justified tactics that killed civilians because Israel had a universal military draft, so every Israeli was a former, present, or future combatant for the Jewish state and could not be considered an "innocent bystander." This argument enabled Hamas to circumvent prohibitions in the Koran against the killing of innocents.

Even as it was introducing new terrorist tactics, Hamas also played a role as a religious, charitable institution, providing medical facilities and other social welfare services to Palestinians, especially those living in the Gaza Strip. Such activities gave Hamas a further degree of legitimacy among Palestinians. They helped the organization recruit young men and women to serve in its military wing, the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades (named after Palestinian nationalist Sheikh Izz ad-Din al-Qassam, b. 1882, killed by the British, 1935).

Hamas in Government

For many years, Hamas resisted cooperating with the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), a coalition dominated by the Fatah party and its long-time leader, Yasser Arafat. Arafat entered into secret negotiations with Israel, resulting in the Oslo Agreement (September 1993), giving the Palestinian Authority limited autonomy over Gaza and the West Bank. After Arafat died in 2004, Hamas organized itself for a new field of operations: competing for election votes.

In the parliamentary elections in January 2006, Hamas won a majority of seats. The following month, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas asked Ismail Haniya of Hamas to form a new government and pursue peace talks with Israel. Hamas formed a government but said peace talks would be a "waste of time." The European Union and the United States tried to use economic pressure to persuade the Hamas-led government to recognize Israel and continue peace negotiations. On February 19, 2006, Israel stopped sending tax receipts to Hamas, creating a potential financial crisis for the Palestinian government. Hamas countered by announcing that Iran would help compensate for the lost revenue and would play a more significant role in Palestinian affairs.

Alarmed by the spread of Iranian influence, Saudi Arabia mediated talks that resulted in the February 2007 Mecca Accord, under which Hamas and Fatah agreed to form a joint government without Hamas compromising to recognize Israel. The Mecca Accord was short-lived, and in May 2007, gunmen fought a brief civil war that resulted in the expulsion of Fatah from Gaza.

Hamas then lost its majority position in the Palestinian Authority. Abbas dissolved parliament and appointed a new prime minister to govern in the West Bank but went to work consolidating its hold on Gaza—officials, administrators, and bureaucrats were replaced at every level of government by appointees loyal to Hamas. Within a few years, Gaza was functioning competently as a "statelet," though with two unusual characteristics. First, it could only raise about a quarter of its budget from taxes; Iran subsidized most of the balance. Second, it kept up a seemingly foolhardy hostility against Israel.

In 2014, Hamas and Fatah made the joint decision to form a new Palestinian Authority Cabinet of nonpartisan ministers, which began its duties in June. Still, the cabinet could not perform the Gaza Strip's administration needs. Hamas continued to govern the area.

Israeli Attacks in 2009 and 2012

Rockets fired from Gaza into southern Israel were a continual source of tension until Egypt mediated a cease-fire in June 2008. Then, in November 2008, Hamas declared an end to the cease-fire, and rocket attacks resumed. At the end of December 2008, Israel launched a series of air attacks, and on January 3, 2009, Israeli ground forces entered Gaza, where they stayed for nearly three weeks. During that time, about 1,300 Palestinians died, including civilians, and many buildings were destroyed. Israel also imposed a land and sea blockade of Gaza, preventing all but basic supplies (such as food) from entering the territory.

Although Israel's withdrawal from Gaza was unilateral, Hamas put its own spin on events. A few hours after Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert declared a unilateral cease-fire on January 18, 2009, Hamas's second-in-command Moussa Abu Marzouk declared on Syrian television that "we in the Palestinian resistance movements announce a cease-fire in the Gaza Strip, and we demand that Israeli forces withdraw in one week and that they open all the border crossings to permit the entry of humanitarian aid and basic goods for our people in Gaza."

Israel continued the blockade, causing long-term disruption in Gaza's economy. The blockade included items such as concrete for reconstruction, which Israel said could be used for military purposes.

An easing in Hamas's position seemed possible when its top leader, Khaled Meshal, said in an interview with the New York Times on May 5, 2009, that his organization would observe a ten-year "truce" with Israel. He said Hamas had stopped launching rockets into Israel as a step toward establishing a unified state of Palestine that would include part of Jerusalem, the West Bank (including Jewish settlements established since 1967), and Gaza. However, rocket and mortar attacks by other jihadist groups continued without interference from Hamas's government in Gaza. There were more than 300 attacks in 2010, more than 600 in 2011, and more than 800 in the first ten months of 2012.

On November 14, 2012, Israel began eight air strikes, killing Hamas's top military commander, Ahmed al-Jabari, and destroying twenty sites for launching rockets. Hamas responded by firing an estimated 1,500 rockets into Israel, including Iranian-designed Fajr-5 rockets, which came close enough to Tel Aviv to trigger air raid sirens. A new cease-fire was negotiated with mediation by the United States and Egypt's President Muhammad Morsi, who had come to office earlier in 2012 as the candidate of the Muslim Brotherhood. Despite the damage in Gaza, Palestinians saw the November hostilities as successful in armed resistance against Israel. Crowds in the West Bank cheered the news that people in Tel Aviv had run for cover in air raid shelters.

Arab Spring and Realignment

Hamas faced a costly choice when the Arab Spring of 2011 led to an uprising in Syria. Bashar al-Assad's government, run by a Shia minority, had a staunch ally in Iran, Hamas's most important funding source. However, Hamas's organizational cousin, the Syrian branch of the Muslim Brotherhood, was a significant partner in the revolt against al-Assad. Hamas chose not to support al-Assad and quietly closed its headquarters in Damascus, with Khaled Meshal relocating to Qatar at the end of 2011. In retaliation, Iran cut off subsidies to Hamas, estimated at $276 million or more annually. Another significant consequence of Hamas's withdrawal from Syria was the dispersion of its top political leaders. No other country in the region was willing to play host to a new headquarters for Hamas, considered a terrorist organization by the United States and European Union. Hamas had moved to Damascus in 1999 after being expelled from Jordan.

With Iranian funding cut off and top officials relocated to different countries, Hamas's political leadership suffered a loss of cohesion and control. Meanwhile, the Gaza leadership gained a stronger voice within the governing Shura Council. The Gaza leadership took over command of the Qassam Brigades from Meshal. In January 2012, Meshal announced that he would step down as Hamas's political leader at the end of the year.

However, Meshal continued to pursue reconciliation with the Palestinian Authority (PA), as proposed in the Cairo Agreement of May 2011. The agreement—calling for a unity government and new parliamentary elections—allowed Hamas to become active again in the West Bank government and represent all Palestinians. It would also revitalize Meshal's position within Hamas and reduce the power of the Gaza leadership, which would have to hand over the administration of Gaza to the newly elected government. To that end, Meshal met in February 2012 with PA President Mahmoud Abbas in Doha, Qatar, and signed a further agreement that filled in some of the details for reconciliation. The Doha deal fell through. It was rejected internally by the Gaza leadership, which said the terms gave too much power to Abbas. The rejection of Meshal's already-signed agreement underscored the dilution of his authority.

Meshal decided to remain the leader of Hamas with the backing of Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood, which brokered $400 million in new funding for Hamas from Qatar. Meshal and Abbas met in Cairo again in January 2013 but could not make progress toward reconciliation. In 2014, Hamas kidnapped and killed three Israeli teen boys from the West Bank. Hamas leaders were pleased, stating it would renew an uprising amongst Palestinians. As a result, the Gaza War ensued, in which the UN cited Israel and Palestine for possibly committing war crimes. The war lasted only fifty days, but nearly 2,300 Palestinians and seventy-three Israelis were killed.

In 2018, the United States Embassy moved from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem under the direction of President Trump. The change signified US support for Israel. Palestinians protested, and nearly sixty were killed. Hamas expressed their dissatisfaction with the decision. In 2021, Israeli police raided the Jerusalem-based Al-Aqsa Mosque on the first night of Ramadan, the Muslim holy month—an insulting and disrespectful act. Retaliating, Hamas began firing rockets at Israel, and Israel responded with airstrikes. Though the groups agreed to a cease-fire in May, Hamas deployed balloons to Israel with explosive devices attached.

Israel took preemptive action against terrorist groups in 2022, but more than forty civilians were killed in the process. Then, in January 2023, Israeli soldiers raided the Jenin refugee camp of the West Bank in hopes of destroying Palestinian militants.

On October 7, 2023, Hamas militants breached Gaza’s border with Israel at multiple points, launching attacks on multiple border towns and military bases, causing the most significant Israeli casualties since the 1973 Yom Kippur War and prompting a swift and large-scale response from the Israeli Defense Force, as the Israeli government of Benjamin Netanyahu declared war on Hamas. As the numbers of casualties in Gaza grew, including many civilians as well as Hamas and Israeli fighters, attempts at reaching a long-term cease-fire failed. While Hamas dismissed a cease-fire agreement proposed by Israel in April 2024, Israel rejected a Hamas-approved proposal the following month; Hamas remained firm on its conditions of a permanent end to fighting and full withdrawal of Israeli troops. Meanwhile, accusations of acts of sexual violence, cruel treatment, hostage-taking, and other atrocities prompted the International Criminal Court to announce its request for warrants to arrest certain Hamas figures for war crimes and crimes against humanity.

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