by Lt. Col. (res.) Dr. Mordechai Kedar
Hamas has failed because it is caught between two irreconcilable principles: establishing a modern, functioning state that provides for its citizens while at the same time maintaining a perpetual state of war against the Jewish State.
Eight Qassam launchers in Gaza, seven
equipped with operating systems and one armed and ready to launch, photo
from IDF Spokesperson's Unit via IDF Flickr
BESA Center Perspectives Paper No. 783, March 28, 2018
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY: Hamas has failed
because it is caught between two irreconcilable principles: establishing
a modern, functioning state that provides for its citizens while at the
same time maintaining a perpetual state of war against the Jewish
State. Neither the PLO’s nationalist ideology nor Hamas’s religious
nationalism have served the interests of the Palestinian people. Only
emirates based on local clans can operate legitimately in the
Palestinian-controlled territories.
When the “Islamic Resistance Movement” – or Hamas,
as it is better known by its Arabic acronym – took over Gaza in 2007,
pundits theorized that once the group became responsible for drinking
water, gasoline, electricity, employment, and food, it would have no
choice but to become more moderate. These commentators predicted Hamas
would soon prefer governing to jihad, exchange terror for state-running,
develop political tools instead of tools of war, and adopt a political
stance instead of one of armed conflict. They could not have been more
wrong, because no Islamic terror organization abandons terror without
being seen as abandoning Islam as well.
In fact, what has happened is a self-immolating
process that can only occur in Islamic societies. This process is a
function of the collective belief shared by Islamic leaders that it is a
religious obligation to stick to their political principles – and that
any deviation from total allegiance to those principles will result in
their falling victim to criticism from others whose religious image is
more vivid and faith-based.
Hamas wants to be considered a political
organization, so it ran in the parliamentary elections in 2006, winning a
majority of the seats. It is now gearing for presidential elections in
which it hopes to take the seat of the president of the PA.
Hamas’s problem is that it is caught between two
contradictory roles. As a political organization it must adopt pragmatic
patterns of behavior, including political negotiations with Israel. As a
religious movement, it must adhere to the principle that forbids any
deviation from the path dictated by Allah, who only allows his earthly
representatives to talk to the Zionist infidels about technical issues
such as transferring food, water, gasoline, electricity, and medical
supplies.
From the standpoint of Hamas, it is not so bad if
Gaza Muslims suffer, because that is considered “bla’a,” one of the
tests Allah presents to believers in order to determine whether or not
they deserve a passport to Paradise. This explains why Hamas is so ready
to sacrifice hundreds and even thousands of innocent civilians in every
military encounter with Israel. It also explains why the Arab world
media present – often successfully – such events as victories for Hamas
and defeats for Israel.
The price for this kind of “victory” is paid by
ordinary Gazans, whose family members are dead or wounded and who have
to live with a shattered infrastructure. These people are not in the
Hamas camp on this issue because they are much less extreme than those
who have taken over their lives.
The religious conceptual framework prevents Hamas
from giving in to the Jews or from doing anything that might be
interpreted as giving in to them, including freeing prisoners or the
bodies of fallen Israeli soldiers who are in Hamas hands or even
providing information about them. It is understood that Hadar Goldin and
Oron Shaul are sadly not among the living, but Hamas spokesmen continue
to refuse to divulge any details about the two, including providing
confirmation of their deaths.
From a religious standpoint, Hamas is mired in a
dark and dismal swamp. Over the 1,400 years since the dawn of Islamic
history, there have been Muslim regimes that treated strangers with
respect, refrained from attacking countries more powerful than they, and
cared about the economic conditions of their subjects. Hamas is light
years away from this type of rule. It is not only uninterested in
improving the health, education, and living standards of the people of
Gaza, but it takes step after step to create a picture of suffering and
want in order to squeeze donations from the international community.
Another element that might spare Gaza further
armed confrontation with Israel – which would come at the expense of
ordinary citizens’ lives, not those of Hamas leaders and their families,
whose underground bunkers protect them – is the readiness of Hamas to
conduct a prisoner exchange with Israel. Yihye Sinwar, the current Hamas
leader freed in the Shalit deal, knows Israel will not free over 1,000
prisoners in exchange for corpses, but is under pressure from Hamas
prisoners and their families. He is finding it almost impossible to
reach a deal that results in fewer prisoners being freed than were
released during his exchange.
Hamas is making use of all kinds of mantras to
justify its obstinate policy: “We will not cowtow to the Zionist entity
on anything!” “We will not give the Zionists any free information!” “We
will continue to struggle for a Palestine from the river to the sea!” No
one on the Gaza street believes these mantras anymore. Nor do they put
their faith in those who post them on the internet or on satellite
stations.
Hamas does everything it can to publicize the
“humanitarian catastrophe” in Gaza, but neglects to mention that the
situation there is a direct result of the way it has governed over the
past decade. The organization has been given billions of dollars by
Qatar, by the donor states, and by international groups that do not
follow up on what happens to their donations. It is also the recipient
of taxes taken off salaries. What does it do with the money? Has it
built schools? Hospitals? Factories? Infrastructure? None of the above.
Some of the money found its way into Hamas
leaders’ private, hidden bank accounts in the Cayman Islands, the Virgin
Islands, or other tax havens (as has also been the case with PLO
leadership). Some was used to purchase homes and apartments for those
leaders. But the bulk of those funds, by far, went to building
underground tunnels, rockets, and other weapons of destruction intended
for use in the war to “liberate” Palestine.
Because the Arab world has turned its back on
Hamas, the organization is close to bankruptcy, a crisis that explains
its new, warm relationship with Iran. Hamas leaders hope to obtain
money, arms, and rockets from the mullahs in Tehran to help them break
the stalemate with Israel. That is why they reconnected with Hezbollah
and are ready to renew Hamas’s Iranian ties.
The Iranian leadership does not hide its joy at
renewing ties with Hamas. The ayatollahs see the group as the long arm
of the Iranian octopus extended towards southern Israel. The goal is to
grasp it in a pincer between Hezbollah in the north and Hamas in the
south. Will this strategy improve life in Gaza? Will Hamas succeed in
convincing unemployed Gazans – 60% of the Strip’s employable
breadwinners – that it is forging this alliance for their benefit?
Hardly.
There is also the evergreen fiasco of Hamas’s
relations with the PLO/PA. These organizations have been at loggerheads
ever since Hamas burst onto the Israeli and international scene in 1988
with the outbreak of the first intifada. The rivalry, hatred, and
jealousy running rampant between them and the insults they hurl at each
other express much more than a political divide. They are proof of basic
cultural differences between West Bank Arabs and those of Gaza. Even
the Arabic spoken in the West Bank differs from that of Gaza. Gaza’s
culture is that of desert-dwelling Bedouin, while the Arabic spoken by
West Bankers is more urban.
The conflict between the PLO and Hamas is
all-encompassing: it is over leadership positions, the treasury (the
breeding ground of corruption), the police, and, most importantly, the
armed forces. Notwithstanding the agreements both sides signed while
smiling at international photographers, the inspired speeches made by
spokesmen lauding the concept of sacred reconciliation – and despite the
public demand to see the PLO and Hamas work together for their shared
goal of establishing a Palestinian Arab state on the ruins of Israel,
the two organizations have failed to rise above their conflicts and keep
the promises that lie at the basis of those agreements. They continue
to castigate, humiliate, and mock one another as the public looks on.
On the other side of the cultural and political
equation are the salafist organizations modeled on al-Qaeda and ISIS.
They have active delegations in Gaza, though most of their activists
have moved to Sinai. Hamas is engaged in a fight to the death with
organizations committed to doing to it exactly what it did to the PLO:
“real” jihad in the name of Islam. Hamas has killed scores of Salafist
activists, including over 30 cut down by machine gun fire on a street in
Rafah after gas grenades were used to force them to exit their mosque.
Hamas, an offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood, was
supposed to create an alternative religious nationalist ethos in
contrast to the secularist nationalism of various Arab organizations. It
failed in its attempt to present an Arab nationalist model of a
democratic, modern state that protects its citizens and provides for
their welfare, health and employment – an ordinary, functioning state
that earns the loyalty of citizens who had previously adhered to their
tribal, ethnic, religious, and group identities.
The Arab nationalist movements have been long sunk
in a morass of despotism. Not one has managed to establish and maintain
a democratic nation-state along the lines of Israel. The Hamas movement
was supposed to offer an alternative religious ethos that could unfurl
its flag over all the tribal and religious groups living in “Falestin”:
Muslims, Christians, Circassians, Ahmadis.
The failure of the religious movement is
attributable in part to its inability to abandon the principle of jihad
long enough to join with the PLO and establish a Palestinian Arab state
alongside Israel until such time as it would be possible to destroy the
Jewish State. Hamas does not see a way to accept Israel’s existence,
even on a temporary basis, and is obligated to maintain a constant state
of war with it (as opposed to incessant active warfare). Waging an
active war would destroy Gaza and topple the Hamas leadership; a
constant state of war justifies the continuation of Gaza’s dismal
situation.
The situation in Gaza provides further proof, for
anyone who still needs it, of the inability of an Islamic movement to
establish and maintain a modern state that can live in peace with its
neighbors and tolerate ideologies different from its own.
The schism dividing the PLO and Hamas is a
cultural divide expressed through political conflict. There is simply no
way for them to unify or establish a true, long-lasting reconciliation.
Anyone counting on one unified Palestinian Arab state had better align
his or her expectations with bitter Middle East reality.
The PLO failed because the secular nationalist
ideology that does so well in Europe cannot succeed in the Middle East.
It has failed in every country in the region that has tried it. Iraq,
Syria, Libya, Yemen, and Sudan are the exemplars.
The Hamas movement failed because fundamentalist
Islam cannot maintain a modern state with Western democratic standards
based on human laws. Turkey, which has been returning to Islam since the
1990s, is also distancing itself more and more from the accepted
Western model of a constitutional democracy.
The conclusion is clear: there is neither a
religious nor a secular basis for establishing a Palestinian Arab state.
The only solution is a return to the natural basis of Middle Eastern
society: the tribe. Only emirates in the West Bank based on local clans,
like those in the Gulf emirates, can operate legitimately in the
region.
An earlier version of this article was translated by Rochel Sylvetsky for Israel National News.
Dr. Mordechai Kedar is a senior research associate at the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies. He served
for 25 years in IDF military intelligence specializing in Syria, Arab
political discourse, Arab mass media, Islamic groups, and Israeli Arabs,
and is an expert on the Muslim Brotherhood and other Islamist groups.
BESA Center Perspectives Papers are published through the generosity of the Greg Rosshandler Family
Source: https://besacenter.org/perspectives-papers/hamas-failure/
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Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.
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