Thread by @cwjones89

Because the bad takes continue to proliferate, I'm making another 🧵. This time we'll be looking at the history, origins, and goals of Hamas.

Where did Hamas come from and what do they want?

To understand the origins of Hamas, we need to go back to Ismailia, Egypt in 1928.

It was here that an Egyptian imam named Hassan al-Banna and six workers of the Suez Canal company founded a movement they called the Muslim Brotherhood.

Egypt in 1928 was complicated: nominally independent, but with British troops garrisoned throughout the country, a constitutional monarchy, nominally democratic but deeply dysfunctional, and deeply divided between the secularizing urban middle & upper classes vs. rural poor.

al-Banna saw all this and thought it was primarily caused by moral decay. Secularization and modernization were the root cause of Egypt's problems. Islam, he argued, contained a complete system for life, not just on an individual basis, but in the political and economic realms.

al-Banna's movement grew rapidly, with c. 500,000 members by the end of the 1930s. The Brotherhood recruited primarily from the rural poor, who were opposed to the secularism and European-facing culturevof the cities, and were economically exploited by the wealthy.

al-Banna strongly opposed European colonialism in the Middle East, because it meant that non-Muslims were ruling over Muslims. He opposed Jewish immigration to Palestine because he saw that it would eventually lead to the same thing.

As I mentioned, Egyptian politics in the 1930s and 1940s was deeply dysfunctional. Political parties had their own armed militias, assassins, and thugs on call to do their dirty work for them. The king also had his own secret paramilitaries called the Iron Guard.

The Brotherhood recruited a few hundred fighters to fight against Israel during the 1948 Arab-Israeli war. They fought alongside the Egyptian army around Gaza.

Back home, the Brotherhood slid into an increasingly violent conflict with the Egyptian government.

On Dec. 28, while the war was still going on, a Brotherhood member assassinated the prime minister. The Iron Guard responded by murdering al-Banna two months later.

In 1952, the monarchy was overthrown by nationalist army officers called the Free Officers Movement.

After Gamel abd al-Nasser took power, he quickly banned political parties, democracy, and the Brotherhood.

Here's video of Nasser publicly roasting the Brotherhood leader Hassan al-Hudaybi for wanting to legally require women to wear hijab:

The Brotherhood went underground. Some members like Sayyid Qutb became more radical and adopted a practice called Takfir, which held that Muslims who did not obey their movement's particular interpretation of Islam were not real Muslims and therefore legitimate targets of jihad.

Qutb was hanged by Nasser in 1966, but his writings would later inspire groups like Egyptian Islamic Jihad, who assassinated Egyptian president Anwar Sadat in 1981.

Most of the Brotherhood, however, turned away from violence and worked peacefully for Islamization.

Hassan al-Hudaybi, wrote a book refuting Qutb called "Preachers, Not Judges." He argued that Muslims who did not fully embrace the group's interpretation of Islam should be taught to do better rather than killed.

The Brotherhood in Egypt turned away from political activism towards providing social services and religious education, and trying to build up popular support to a level where they could some day be able take power.

So how does this tie to Gaza? Gaza had been ruled by Egypt from 1948-1967. Egypt required Palestinian refugees to live in Gaza rather than in Egypt proper, which is part of why Gaza is incredibly densely populated today.

The Brotherhood organized in Gaza as well as Egypt.

Palestinian militant groups in the 1960s and 1970s were either secular Arab nationalists or various flavors of Marxists rather than Islamist.

But the Brotherhood in the 1970s wasn't about violent struggle, they were about peacefully converting people to their ideology.

After Israel captured Gaza in 1967, they tolerated the Brotherhood. They weren't killing anyone, they were opposed to the Marxists and Arab nationalists, and they were building schools and teaching people religious morals.

In 1979, Israel allowed a group called Mujama al-Islamiya, founded by a quadriplegic Brotherhood teacher named Sheikh Ahmad Yassin, to register as an official charity organization.

Yassin was born in al-Jura near Ashkelon. He came to Gaza as a refugee in 1948 at the age of 12.

The first signs that Yassin and his followers would turn to violence came in 1984, when the IDF arrested Ibrahim al-Maqadmeh for arms smuggling.

He confessed to being part of an Islamist group called the Palestinian Fighters, led by Yassin. Yassin was arrested and convicted.

His 13-year jail sentence turned out to be 1 year, because in 1985 Israel released 1,150 Palestinian prisoners in exchange for three Israeli soldiers who had been captured by the PFLP-General Command in Lebanon.

The West Bank and Gaza Strip in the 1980s were a tinderbox. 40% of Palestinians worked in Israel, primarily in low wage jobs. There were very few jobs for people with a university education. There was Palestinian no self-government - everything was governed by the IDF.

Poverty and constant harassment by the security forces were the norm. The years 1984-1987 saw increasing violence between Israelis and Palestinians. This violence was disorganized - individual murders on both sides, riots, and violent IDF responses even to peaceful protests.

On December 8 1987 an Israeli army tractor-trailer crashed into a line of cars returning to Gaza from work in Israel. Four Palestinians were killed. Several days of rioting resulted during which six Palestinians were killed by the IDF. The First Intifada had begun.

A week later Yassin & others founded Hamas.

Hamas is actually an acronym, which stands for "Ḥarakat al-Muqāwamah al-ʾIslāmiyyah" or "Islamic Resistance Movement."

What were their goals? Well, they stated them quite explicitly in 1988: avalon.law.yale.edu/20th_century/h…

The 1988 charter is as explicit as can be about some key points:

- Hamas seeks to establish an Islamist Palestinian state from the Mediterranean to the Jordan.
- Any negotiated two-state solution is to be rejected.
- Violence is the only way to achieve their goals.

Hamas has nuanced views on the nation-state. Unlike Salafi-Jihadis who reject the nation-state as idolatrous, Hamas stated that "Nationalism...is part of the religious creed" and that the PLO is a close ally even as they are insufficiently Islamic.

Yet, Hamas was also clear that the occupation of 1967 and the suppression of Palestinian national aspirations were not their primary problem with Israel.

Their problem with Israel is that non-Muslims are ruling over land formerly conquered and ruled over by Muslims.

True peace, they say, will only be achieved when Muslims are returned to their rightful place as the ruling class ruling over Christians and Jews.

It is the duty of all Muslims to fight to restore lands formerly ruled by Muslims to Muslim control.

From Article 31:

In 1993, Hamas reaffirmed this last point in a document called the "Introductory Memorandum" which was appears to have been aimed at the PLO's negotiations with Israel in Oslo:

(Source: ) bora.uib.no/bora-xmlui/han…

Yet as you probably know, on September 13 1993 Yasser Arafat signed a deal with Israel anyways which allowed for PLO rule over most of the populated areas of the West Bank and Gaza Strip in hopes that this would eventually lead to the establishment of a Palestinian state.

Hamas strongly opposed the Oslo process and any two-state solution. They saw this as a betrayal of one of their founding principles - that non-Muslims could rule over formerly Muslim lands.

They responded with a campaign of violence.

Until this point, Hamas had mainly targeted the Israeli military. The group's first suicide bombing in April 1993 targeted an Israeli military checkpoint, although the only person killed was a Palestinian bystander: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mehola_Ju…

On April 6 1994 a 19-year old Hamas member named Ra'id Zaqarna detonated a car bomb next to a bus in Afula, killing 8 Israelis.

Hamas claimed the attack was in retaliation for the Hebron Massacre in February 1994 when far-right Jewish extremist Baruch Goldstein killed 29 people.

This was nonsense. Goldstein was a lone wolf. Hamas' suicide bombings were part of a coordinated strategic campaign to disrupt the Oslo Accords.

Between 1994 and 1998, Hamas carried out at least 14 suicide bombings which killed 122 people, almost all civilians.

In Israel, the wave of suicide bombings boosted the arguments of those who thought that the Oslo Accords were undermining Israel's security.

The result was that Israel elected Benjamin Netanyahu for his first term as Prime Minister in 1996.

Netanyahu promised to pursue the Oslo process only in a way which could guarantee Israel's security. He pressured the Palestinian Authority to crack down on Hamas and other Islamist groups. The suicide bombing campaign was suppressed with many Hamas members sitting in PA jails.

Netanyahu also massively expanded the West Bank settlements, seeking to make it politically impossible for a future government to hand over control of more of the West Bank to the PA:

Fast forward to 2000. After the failure of the Camp David II talks, Yasser Arafat plans an armed uprising:

As the uprising begins, he releases hundreds of Hamas members from prison so they can fight Israel. Hamas and the PLO are now allies.cfr.org/blog/arafat-an…

Hamas carried out 50 suicide bombings during this period, killing 325 Israelis, almost all civilians.

Most of Hamas' first generation of leadership, including Yassin and al-Maqadmeh, were killed during the Second Intifada by targeted missile strikes by the IDF.

In 2004 Arafat dies. An election is held in 2005 to decide on his replacement. Hamas boycotts the election. Mahmoud Abbas wins handily.

Later that year Hamas signs the Cairo Declaration, dropping its opposition to the PLO: web.archive.org/web/2007070416…

In Palestinian legislative elections in January 2006, Hamas wins a plurality of the popular vote and a majority of the seats. Ismail Haniyeh becomes PA Prime Minister.

Palestinian politics in 2006-2007 becomes a power struggle between Abbas and Haniyeh.

Many in the West are trying to figure out in this time if Hamas is moderating its stance. After all, now the movement actually has something to lose. Are they still serious about their 1988 charter? Will they settle for less?

From 2006-08, Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal repeatedly proposed a 'long-term truce' if Israel withdrew to the pre-1967 borders and recognized a Palestinian state.

He clarified this truce would last ten years, and that Hamas would not recognize Israel: arabnews.com/node/311219

Was this a serious offer?

I contend that it was not. In order to understand the role of the offer, we need to go back to the PLO charter of 1964.

The charter (updated in 1968) is clear: Palestine is indivisible. Only Jews who lived their prior to 1881 will be allowed to stay.

1964:
1968:

In 1974, the PLO issued an update called the Ten-Point Plan: web.archive.org/web/2010113014…
avalon.law.yale.edu/20th_century/p…
web.archive.org/web/2011080519…

The Ten-Point Plan had a very slight change: it called on the PLO to establish its control "over every part of Palestinian territory that is liberated."

After which the goals would shift to:

"completing the liberation of all Palestinian territory"

Most Marxist groups left the PLO in anger and formed a 'Rejectionist Front.' They saw this change as the first step towards accepting a two-state solution.

But was it? Or was it merely gradualist: first take back part of Palestine, then build military power to take the rest?

Meshaal's proposal needs to be considered in this light. It represents a move away from the strategy that all of Palestine is indivisible and must be liberated at once towards a strategy that Palestine could be retaken gradually.

If such an arrangement was meant to be permanent, why would the proposed truce only last 10 years?

Hamas issued a new charter in 2017 which replaced the 1988 document: middleeasteye.net/news/hamas-201…

In it, Hamas reaffirms some aspects of the 2018 document, such as that Israel's existence is a threat to Muslim unity, and that they will never recognize Israel.

However they also concede that a Palestinian state on the 1967 borders, coupled with the "right of return" of all 1948 refugees and their descendants is "a formula of national consensus" while rejecting any compromise less than all of Palestine "from the river to the sea."

So Hamas is essentially signaling that they recognize that a state in the 1967 borders is a popular compromise, which they might accept for a time, but will never give up the goal of taking all of the former British Mandate of Palestine & expelling the vast majority of its Jews.

In other words, they moved from the Rejectionist Front position to the more gradualist 1974 position.

Will they move towards a two-state solution? I doubt it. They are quite clear that the goal of a Muslim-dominated Palestine is a religious doctrine. It's hard to walk that back.

Where do the mass atrocities committed on 10/7 fit into this picture?

10/7 was a deliberately planned atrocity. Hamas has used atrocities against civilians as a deliberate strategy in the past as well, like the 1994 suicide bombing campaign.

I wrote here that they were partially driven by the prospect of Israeli-Saudi normalization.

But there's also an internal Palestinian angle to consider.

The PA government fell apart in 2007. Hamas seized control over the Gaza Strip in a violent coup.

https://twitter.com/cwjones89/status/1711093453516358123

New elections have been repeatedly postponed. Abbas is now in year 18 of the four-year term he won in 2005.

The USA and other Quartet powers have acquiesced and aided this because they fear that Hamas will win again.

Israel also fears a Hamas victory, plus for Netanyahu having a divided Palestinian government ensures there is no credible negotiating partner on the Palestinian side.

Hamas winning a military victory against Israel has the potential to decisively sideline Abbas and the PA in Palestinian politics. Hamas will have decisively demonstrated that they can produce results.

The PA is currently very weak. If the PA collapses, then Hamas can take over.

They are gambling that, given the option of recognizing a Hamas-led government, or recognizing no Palestinian government at all, much of the world will recognize the Hamas-led government.

That's step 1 of the gradualist plan.

All they need to do in order to make it happen is to hold on to control over Gaza after the current war is over, along with some of the hostages whose release Israel will then be forced to negotiate for.

Abbas is 87. He won't be president of the PA for much longer.

Hamas, armed with a legitimizing victory, can then step into the role as the primary Palestinian faction.

Will the world ignore the massacres of 10/7 and work with them directly? Current evidence suggests that many countries will, but the EU and US probably won't.

Some may argue that most Palestinians do not support Hamas. Polls suggest that this is true (pre 10/7):

But that doesn't necessarily matter. "Not-Hamas" is not an organized political position. History is full of dedicated minority parties triumphing over fragmented opposition.

https://twitter.com/cblatts/status/1717879998575530000

THE END

PS - many of the thousands of Hamas members currently imprisoned in Israel are from the West Bank. If they are released, they will provide an instant boost to Hamas' currently weak strength in the West Bank, further contributing to a government in waiting.