No, Hamas is not committed to the obliteration of Israel

Iain Davis

The former UK Home Secretary, Suella Braverman MP, claimed that chants calling for a free Palestine “from the river to the sea” showed that the large pro-Palestinian marches in London—sparked by Israel’s bombardment of Gaza—were “hate marches.” Largely as a result, but also for domestic political reasons, Braverman was ousted (“resigned”) from her cabinet position.

Speaking in March 2023 to the Jewish Community Security Trust (CST), prior to the protests she criticised, Braverman said “my husband is a proud Jew and Zionist.” This does not mean that Suella Braverman is a Zionist herself, but she is clearly sympathetic to Zionist arguments. The claim that the chant is antisemitic is one interpretation among many.

The slogan “from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” is often considered antisemitic because the assumption is it infers no “homeland” for the Jews. In fact, the phrase became widely used as a political slogan during the 1960’s. It was largely promulgated by the Palestinian Liberation Organisation (PLO), who were instrumental in forming the present Palestinian Authority (PA).

In this context, it referred to a secular Palestinian state where Jews, Muslims, Christians and other Palestinian Arabs were to have equal rights and live alongside each other. It did not imply the obliteration of a Jewish homeland.

The same slogan has also been inverted and incorporated into the founding charter of Israel’s current ruling Zionist Likud Party, which reads:

[. . .] between the Sea and the Jordan there will only be Israeli sovereignty.

Few people consider this to constitute racist “hate speech.”

It is the insistence of some, that Palestinian and Israeli interests are diametrically opposed and exclusionary, that perpetuates seemingly interminable conflict. As highlighted by Kenan Malik, writing for the UK Guardian:

The tragedy today is that on one side in the Israel/Palestine conflict, “escaping oppression” has come to mean rebuilding a Jewish state in Palestine and conquering Jerusalem. And, for too many on the other side, freeing Palestine has come to mean freeing it of Jews and of denying Jews the right to escape oppression.

While all sides are mired in dehumanising hate and intolerance, there seems little prospect of a peaceful resolution. This article is written in the firm belief that reconciliation and peace are possible. Despite the seemingly intractable confrontation, there is an evident path toward a peaceful solution if people are willing to make the necessary compromises to take it.

Al-Aqsa Flood

The overwhelming weight of evidence suggests that Hamas’ Al-Aqsa Flood attack on Israel was a false flag. It almost impossible to envisage how it could have unfolded as it did without at least some assistance from the Israeli state, or elements within the Israeli state.

It has now become clear that much of the atrocity propaganda spread in the immediate aftermath of the 7th October attack was completely baseless. In addition, as more evidence emerges, it is increasingly apparent that an unknown number of Israeli citizens died at the hands of Israel’s own security services.

There is no doubt that Hamas was also responsible for Israeli civilian deaths. Hamas is a proscribed terrorist organisation for good reason. Nevertheless, as we have seen in Northern Ireland, South Africa and elsewhere, just because an organisation can be legitimately described as “supporting terrorism” that does not mean it cannot turn away from violence.

While Hamas should be held responsible for murdering Israeli civilians, unless some sort of independent investigation is undertaken, there is no evidence enabling clear attribution of Israeli casualty figures incurred during Al-Aqsa Flood. To this extent, we simply do not know where the truth lies at this stage.

Hamas, in the form it takes today, was largely created by Israel. It is currently funded by an international governmental network that includes Iran, Qatar, UAE and, via the UN and the Palestinian Authority (PA), the US, EU members states, the UK, Saudi Arabia and others.

Much of this funding, earmarked as “aid” for the people of Gaza, is said to be carefully distributed in order to ensure Hamas doesn’t use it to buy weapons or train its military wing, the Al-Qassam Brigades. However, the Shin Bet—Israel’s domestic intelligence agency—estimates a third of all funds that enter Gaza are taken by Hamas.

When the extent of Hamas’ investment portfolio was discovered, no government did anything to stem the flow of cash to Hamas. It is extremely unlikely that Al-Aqsa Flood could have proceeded if governments had coordinated to cut off Hamas funds. Despite Israel’s military response, Hamas reportedly remains “financially solid.”

Israel’s attack upon Gaza and the West Bank, using Al-Aqsa Flood as claimed justification, appears to meet the UN definition of genocide. The South African government has lodged a case against Israel with the UN’s International Court of Justice on those grounds.

The International Court of Justice (ICJ) issued a provisional measures order forbidding Israel or any of its security forces engaging in any acts identified as components of genocide by the 1948 Genocide Convention. While the order is not a ruling on Israel’s suspected genocide of the Palestinian people, the ICJ notably remarked:

At the present stage of the proceedings, the Court is not required to ascertain whether any violations of Israel’s obligations under the Genocide Convention have occurred. [. . .] [T]he Court’s task [at this stage] is to establish whether the acts and omissions complained of by the applicant [South Africa] appear to be capable of falling within the provisions of the Genocide Convention. [. . .] In the Court’s view, at least some of the acts and omissions alleged by South Africa to have been committed by Israel in Gaza appear to be capable of falling within the provisions of the Convention.

Hamas is opposed to the Israeli government’s occupation and its objectives, if not its methods, are supported by many Palestinian people. Whether willingly or not, Hamas is also extremely useful to the current Israeli government. Key to its utility for the Israeli state is the claim that Hamas’ comprehensively rejects the two-state solution and is allegedly committed to the total “obliteration” of the Israeli state.

There are many reasons to question this assertion.

The Zionist Entity

As we shall see, from a policy perspective, Hamas is not opposed to Jews. Nor is it necessarily opposed to a Jewish state in Palestine. There does appear to be room for negotiation if Hamas can reject violence. Hamas does not recognise the current state of Israel and considers it wholly illegitimate because it views it as a settler colonial project of what it calls “the Zionist entity.”

Israel does not have a constitution but instead a set of basic laws. This defines Israel as “the nation-state of the Jewish people.” There is no mention of Zion or Zionism in Israel’s state laws.

Zionism is said to be “the national movement for the return of the Jewish people to their homeland and the resumption of Jewish sovereignty in the Land of Israel.” This is a narrow definition that overlooks many components of Zionism.

The political term “Zionism” was first coined in 1890 by Nathan Birnbaum. While many consider Theodore Herzl’s 1896 publication of the “The Jewish State” to mark the beginning of the political Zionist project, the roots of both political and religious Zionism are found in the puritanical Christian movements that first emerged in England and took root in British Colonial America in the 17th and 18th century.

The theological concept of “dispensationalism,” and the associated dogma of the claimed “rapture,” underpins “religious Zionism.” These theories were largely developed by English-Irish preacher, and many would say charlatan, John Nelson Darby (1800 – 1882).

Prior to WWI, Jews living in North Africa and the Middle East generally lived in peace alongside Arabs, Muslims, Christians and people from many other ethnic and faith groups. European Jewish emigration to the Middle East, often fleeing pogroms in Lithuania, Russia, Spain and elsewhere, was not inspired by or reliant upon political Zionism.

Until the early 20th century, the socialist workers movement of the Bund captured the European Jewish majority’s political affiliation. This broadly socialist, anti-Zionist Jewish tradition continues today within groups like the Jewish Bloc and the International Jewish Anti-Zionist Network. During the late 19th and early 20th century, Jews that emigrated to Palestine continued to coexist with other “Palestinians” in relative harmony.

It was the Zionists who arguably introduced the idea of European (white) Jewish supremacy. In “The Jewish State,” Theodore Herzl’s wrote:

We [Zionists] should there [Israel] form a portion of a rampart of Europe against Asia, an outpost of civilization as opposed to barbarism.

This Zionist idea, that some Jews are “civilised” while the other people in the region, including some indigenous Jews, are “barbarians,” has remained. In 2006, Ehud Barak—Israel’s Prime Minister (1999 – 2001)—said that modern day Israel was akin to “a villa in the jungle.”

In his 2023 Christmas message to Christian nations, the Zionist Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, again listed some dubious allegations of Hamas atrocities before reiterating the sentiments of Theodore Herzl. Referencing the suspected genocidal response of the Israeli state to Al-Aqsa Flood, he said:

This is a battle, not only of Israel against these barbarians, it’s a battle of civilization against barbarism.

Influential Zionists like Arthur Ruppin were eugenicists. He considered Mizrahi Jews—the ethnic Jews of the Middle East and North Africa (MENA)—and Sephardic Jews—Iberian Jews—to be racially inferior to the Askhenazi Jews from northern and eastern Europe.

While today we would consider Ruppin’s Zionist view to be “racist,” we should acknowledge that comparing historical attitudes to modern day mores isn’t always straightforward. Eugenics was the pseudo-scientific “racial purity” theory of its day and “racism” had yet to be firmly defined or widely understood as a clear form of oppression.

Eugenics found a home in the Family Planning movement and its practical application has continued. In 2013 Israeli officials admitted they had been running an effective forced sterilization campaign of Ethiopian Jews in Israel.

Going back to 1917, thanks in part to a well funded political campaign led by UK Zionist Lionel Walter Rothschild and his agent in Britain, Chaim Weizmann, with the full backing of then British Prime Minister and Zionist David Lloyd George, the British Foreign Secretary Arthur Balfour wrote a letter to Rothschild declaring British government support for the establishment of a Jewish state in Palestine. Notably, the Balfour Declaration stated:

His Majesty’s Government view with favor the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavors to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country.

The 1919 Treaty of Versailles gave rise to the League of Nation’s mandate system that apportioned the colonial territories detached from Germany and the Ottoman Empire during WWI. Based largely upon the Balfour Declaration, the 1920 Conference in San Remo established the British Mandate in Palestine—Mandatory Palestine. The mandate was subsequently ratified by the League of Nations in 1922.

The Arab revolt in Palestine, which included acts of terrorism, began in 1936 as mass Jewish immigration—Aliyah—continued. While the British maintained immigration quotas, European Jewish emigrants were given preferential land purchase agreements, displacing Palestinian Arab communities.

As tensions escalated, in 1937, the British “Peel Commission” attempted to resolve the issue by recommending partitioning Mandatory Palestine into Arab and Jewish territories. This was unacceptable to both Arabs and Zionists. The Arab revolt reignited and, in 1938, the Peel recommendations were rejected as unworkable by the British parliament.

In 1939 the British Parliament issued a White Paper that proposed a single Palestinian state and greatly reduced Jewish immigration quotas. Following initial rejections, the Arab Palestinians eventually agreed to the proposal in 1940. The Zionists rejected the White Paper and began a paramilitary and terrorist campaign against both Palestinian Arab and British Mandate targets. Regional political violence was temporarily interrupted by the outbreak of WWII.

A full Zionist insurgency against British rule in Mandatory Palestine began in 1944. Consequently, the British deferred to the new post WWII authority of the United Nations (UN). In 1947, UN resolution 181(ii) again proposed partition which remained unacceptable to both Arab Palestinians and Zionists. The ongoing Zionist insurgency culminated in May 1948 with the signing of the Israeli Declaration of Independence by the Executive Head of the World Zionist Organization, David Ben-Gurion.

This marked the start of the Arab-Israeli War (15th May 1948 – 10th March 1949) which Israel won. The Zionists simultaneously embarked upon what evidently constitutes a genocide of the Palestinians called the Nakba (Naqba – catastrophe). Succinctly, the Nakba can be described as follows:

[. . .] the ethnic cleansing of Palestine by Zionist militias to make way for the creation of Israel in 1948. In a premeditated military campaign, Zionist forces killed thousands of Palestinians, destroyed hundreds of villages and forcibly expelled 80 percent of the Palestinian population from their homeland. After more than a year of relentless violence, the newly created State of Israel captured 78 percent of historic Palestine. The remaining 22 percent, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, were occupied by Israel 19 years later [1967] and remain under Israeli military rule.

The Difference Between Jew, Israeli and Zionist

Like most modern societies, there have been marked improvements to race relations within Israel. Nevertheless, evident inequality of opportunity between Jewish populations persists, although it is generally not as bad as the structural discrimination faced by Palestinian Israelis—so-called Arab Israelis. As in any developed nation, the political milieu in Israel is complex.

In addition to the different ethnic Jewish communities, religious observance in Israel varies. A 2016 population survey by the Pew Research Center indicated that nearly all Israeli Jews identify with one of four groups:

Haredi (commonly translated as “ultra-Orthodox”) [8% of the total population], Dati (“religious”) [10%], Masorti (“traditional”) [23%] or Hiloni (“secular”) [40%].

It is not true to say that Zionism seeks to create and protect the sovereignty of “the Jewish people.” It seeks to empower the sovereignty of the Jewish state, often at the expense of some Jews. Zionism consistently elevates the importance of the Jewish political state over the lives of ordinary Jewish people.

According to the American-Israeli Cooperative Enterprise, a major split occurred between the Zionists who wished to boycott Hitler’s Nazi government and others who sought to “protect” Jews through appeasement and exerting what leverage they could. David Ben-Gurion, the Zionist national founder the state of Israel, was among the Zionists who supported the 1933 “transfer agreement” that effectively enabled the Nazis to “subvert” the boycott.

Under the Haavara agreement contract, wealthier German Jews were encouraged to emigrate to Palestine. Their frozen German assets were used to purchase German goods. Once sold, the Jewish emigrants kept the proceeds minus German taxes and the Zionist’s administration fees. The Zionists then used the money taken from Jewish emigrants to finance construction of the Israeli state.

In 1935 the Nazi government enacted what became known and the Nuremberg Race Laws. This cast all alleged “non-Aryan races,” including Jews, as second class citizens and severely restricted their civil rights and liberties. The violence against working class Jews and their small businesses continued in Germany and, on 9th November 1938, a series of pogroms— collectively referred to as Kristalnacht—were initiated across Germany. More than 90 Jews were killed in two days and nights of Nazi orchestrated street violence.

The danger faced by German Jews was indisputable. Yet, speaking in December 1938, with the transfer agreement still in operation, Ben-Gurion said:

If I knew it was possible to save all [the Jewish] children of Germany by their transfer to England [or] only half of them by transferring them to Eretz-Yisrael [the Land of Israel], I would choose the latter – because we are faced not only with the accounting of these [Jewish] children but also with the historical accounting of the Jewish People.

In seeking to establish and protect the state of Israel, Zionists have always considered some “Jewish people” to be expendable. To this day, a number of Zionists consider certain Jews more expendable than others. Following Al-Aqsa Flood, the chair of the Knesset’s Constitution, Law and Justice Committee and leading member of the Religious Zionist Party (RZP), Simcha Rothman, reportedly said:

Jews murdered in the West Bank are more important than Jews murdered in Gaza because the former are right-wing settlers and the latter are left-wing kibbutz members.

Key to the arguments of Zionists, who claim that Zionism is inseparable from Judaism, is the idea that a modern Jewish state could not exist without Zionism. For example, writing for the Jerusalem Post, former presidential advisor and US ambassador to Israel, David Friedman, wrote:

Being an anti-Zionist is [. . .] deeply offensive from a moral perspective. Israel is the only Jewish state. Opposing its right to exist is to oppose the right of the Jews, and only the Jews, to a state of their own. [. . .] Only the Jewish people [are] denied a homeland by anti-Zionists. Such denial is incompatible with Jewish survival and decidedly antisemitic. [. . .] Judaism and Zionism always have been inextricably intertwined throughout the ages.

Friedman’s expressed opinion is eminently questionable.

The Kurds, the Basques, Catalans, Kashmiris, Tibetans, Uyghurs, Tamils and many more people around the world, don’t have the independent states they desire. It is not “only the Jews” who would be stateless if they were “denied a homeland.”

States are formed through conquest or violent struggle prior to any political settlement. There is no universal “right” for any people to have an ethno-nationalist or theocratic state of their own. This realisation does not invalidate the inalienable right of the Jewish people to defend their state any more than it invalidates the inalienable rights of the Kurds or the Uyghurs to seek one.

Judaism is the oldest of the Abrahamic religions. It predates both political and religious Zionism by thousands of years. It is misleading to claim that Zionism and Judaism have been “inextricably intertwined throughout the ages.” While the notion of the exiles (the Jews) being restored to Zion—interpreted as the Jewish homeland—is a Judaic principle, the 19th century political movement of Zionism took its name from scripture. It is not definitively intrinsic to scripture.

If Zionism was the only possible political movement through which Jews could establish or maintain their own “Jewish homeland” then it could be argued to be “inextricably intertwined” with Judaism. Zionism may have been embraced by many Jews, but the claim that only Zionism can deliver a Jewish state, or “homeland,” is not true. The idea that Zionism is innate to Judaism is patently false.

According to the researchers at Anne Frank House, who specialise in the study of antisemitism and its impacts:

[. . .] although many Jews identify with Zionism, there are still many different points of view. That is reason enough not to mix up the words ‘Jew’, ‘Israelis’ and ‘Zionists’.

Anti-Zionism is not “decidedly antisemitic.” Opposition to Zionism is the rejection of an overtly political ideology that claims questionable religious legitimacy, and nothing more. “Being an anti-Zionist” is not to deny “the Jews, and only the Jews” a state of their own.

The International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) working definition of antisemitism states that antisemitism includes “holding Jews collectively responsible for actions of the state of Israel.” While “denying the Jewish people their right to self-determination” is also included in the definition, the IHRA also draws a distinction between Jews and the government of the “state of Israel.”

There are paths toward an Israeli state, advocated by many Jews, that have nothing to do with Zionism. For example, the Israeli Federation Movement proposes a single, secular Israeli state, encompassing Gaza and the West Bank, which affords equal rights to all citizens, including all Palestinians. This isn’t unthinkable.

Many Israeli Jews are “non practicing” and secular. The notion of an exclusively Jewish state or a Jewish theocracy is found in Zionism, but it is not the only possible route to a functioning state that would defend Jewish rights and provide a “Jewish homeland.” As pointed out by Israeli journalist and author Gideon Levy:

[. . .]  the Palestinian right of return is not meant to throw the Jews into the sea; the one-state solution is not meant to repatriate the Jews to Europe. All of these only wish to partially and belatedly repair an historic wrong wrought by Zionism.

Hamas Offers of Negotiation

Published in August 1988 Hamas original charter, or “covenant,” stated the following:

Israel will exist and will continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it. [. . .] The Zionist invasion is a vicious invasion.

Following Al-Aqsa Flood, the global legacy media was quick to allege that Hamas “wants to destroy Israel and replace it with an Islamic state.” This echoed the repeated claims of Benjamin Netanyahu and other Zionist Israeli officials. As we shall see, it is also a reflection of the statements made by some senior Hamas officials. But that still doesn’t make it true.

Announcing that Israel was at war with Hamas, and listing numerous allegations of atrocities that have largely been revealed false, Netanyahu said:

We are in an operation for our home, a war to ensure our existence.

This idea that Hamas presents an existential threat to Israel is debatable. It seems there are some within Hamas who would be open to a “two-state solution” if that offer was on the table.

While Hamas 1988 covenant alluded to the obliteration of Israel it has never been fully adopted as “official” Hamas policy. In 2006, The former Hamas leader Khaled Meshal said that the covenant “should not be regarded as the fundamental ideological frame of reference from which the movement takes its positions.”

In June 1988, prior to publication of the covenant, Hamas co-founder, Dr Mahmoud al-Zahar, proposed a peaceful resolution in a submission to then Israeli Defense Minister Yitzhak Rabin. Al-Zahar required Israel to withdraw from Gaza and the West Bank, respect Palestinian autonomy and then negotiate openly with the Palestinian government he envisaged. There was no declared intention to destroy Israel.

In 1989, after publication of the covenant, Hamas ideological founder and leader of its Muslim Brotherhood backed precursor organisation—Mujama—Sheik Ahmed Yassin, said:

[. . .] If Israel acknowledges our full rights and recognizes the Palestinian people’s right to live in its homeland in freedom and independence [. . .] I do not want to destroy Israel. [. . .] We want to negotiate with Israel so the Palestinian people inside and outside Palestine can live in Palestine. Then the problem will cease to exist.

In 2002 Hamas accepted the Arab League initiative requesting a cessation of hostilities and normalisation of relationships with Israel in return for establishment of Palestinian state defined by the 1967 “Green Line” border.

As noted by Dr Martin Kear, Hamas signed the Cairo Declaration in 2005. In doing so “Hamas declared its support for the democratic process and a willingness to contest local and legislative council elections.” The intention to threaten the existence of Israel was, again, notably absent from the Declaration.

In 2006, when the head of Hamas’s political bureau, Ismail Haniyeh, became the incumbent Prime Minister of the Palestinian Authority, he told the Washington Post that Hamas wanted the violence to stop and would accept a Palestinian state drawn along the lines of the 1967 border. He told reporters:

We do not have any feelings of animosity toward Jews. We do not wish to throw them into the sea.

Again, in 2014, Hamas co-founder Sheikh Hassan Yousef said that Hamas would consider a negotiated settlement with the Israeli government. Yet, to this day, the myth persists that Hamas will only accept the complete destruction of Israel.

Elements within both Hamas and the Israeli government maintain this illusion. The question is why?

Hamas Policy

While he indicated that negotiation was possible, speaking in 2010, Mahmoud al-Zahar also said:

Our ultimate plan is [to establish] Palestine in its entirety. I say this loud and clear so that nobody will accuse me of employing political tactics. We will not recognize the Israeli enemy.

This one of the quotes often cited by those that claim that Hamas intends to “obliterate” Israel. But Hamas refusal to “recognise” the Israeli state does not signify its intention to destroy it. Hamas has frequently indicated that is does not consider the covenant an “absolute.”

In 2017 Hamas issued its new Document of General Principles and Policies. With less religious rhetoric and more political nuance than the 1988 covenant, this represents actual Hamas “policy.” It is often referred to as the revised Hamas charter.

Hamas consider the current state of Israel to be a “racist, aggressive, colonial and expansionist [Zionist] project.” It insists that the Palestinians have the “right of return” to a Palestinian state defined as the land which “extends from the River Jordan in the east to the Mediterranean in the west and from Ras Al-Naqurah in the north to Umm Al-Rashrash in the south.” This encompasses modern Israel in its entirety.

The territorial claim in the “revised Hamas charter” again lends itself to the allegation that Hamas wishes to destroy Israel. However, if peace is the goal, perhaps it is worth trying to understand Hamas’ political argument in full.

Hamas draws a very clear distinction between Jews and Zionists. It alleges that the Zionism is little more than a colonialist endeavour and that the Zionist claim to represent all those who follow Judaism is illegitimate. The 2017 charter notes:

Hamas affirms that its conflict is with the Zionist project not with the Jews because of their religion. Hamas does not wage a struggle against the Jews because they are Jewish but wages a struggle against the Zionists who occupy Palestine. Yet, it is the Zionists who constantly identify Judaism and the Jews with their own colonial project and illegal entity.

Hamas further defined its policy towards Jews:

Hamas rejects the persecution of any human being or the undermining of his or her rights on nationalist, religious or sectarian grounds. Hamas is of the view that the Jewish problem, anti-Semitism and the persecution of the Jews are phenomena fundamentally linked to European history and not to the history of the Arabs and the Muslims or to their heritage. The Zionist movement, which was able with the help of Western powers to occupy Palestine, is the most dangerous form of settlement occupation which has already disappeared from much of the world and must disappear from Palestine.

Hamas refuses to accept the current political integrity or territorial boundaries of the Israeli state because it does not recognise “the legitimacy of the Zionist entity.” It is very clear that Hamas’ stated policy is opposed to the perceived Zionist Entity’s occupation of Palestinian land.

Under the IHRA definition, Hamas’ accusation that the current Israeli state is a racists project constitutes antisemitism because this supposedly denies the Jewish people “their right to self-determination.” Conversely, Hamas policy does not hold “Jews collectively responsible for actions of the state of Israel.” There is an apparent contradiction in the IHRA definition.

An accusation that the Israeli state is a “racist” endeavour cannot be an accusation that Jews are “racist” if Jews are not held “collectively responsible for actions of the state of Israel.” Therefore, nor does the accusation of a racists Zionist project deny the Jewish people’s “right to self-determination.” Jews, Israelis and Zionists are not synonymous.

Hamas‘ conception’ of the Zionist-Israeli state can be seen as distinct from its Islamist goals. These religious objectives don’t necessarily compel Hamas members to pursue the destruction of Jews, or Judaism, either.

The concept of the Islamic Ummah is important to Hamas. It does not mean “state,” in the Westphalian sense, though it is often interpreted that way. It is closer to the idea of a global Muslim community. It places a responsibility upon every Muslim to advocate Islam because, according to the Quran, all of humanity is “one single Ummah.”

While advocacy of a worldwide Islamic Ummah stems from aspirational religious dogma, it also has practical policy implications. Hamas considers the Palestinians’ inalienable (natural) right to return to all “occupied” lands an imperative. But simultaneously it remains open to retaining borders that would enable the continuance of a state of Israel:

The Palestinian cause in its essence is a cause of an occupied land and a displaced people. The right of the Palestinian refugees and the displaced to return to their homes from which they were banished or were banned from returning to – whether in the lands occupied in 1948 or in 1967 (that is the whole of Palestine), is a natural right, both individual and collective.

Hamas rejects the British Mandate or “Mandatory Palestine” that defined the geographical territorial area of what we would today call modern Israel and the Palestinian occupied territories—Gaza and the West Bank. With regard to the future Palestinian state that Hamas wants, its published policy is as follows:

Hamas rejects any alternative to the full and complete liberation of Palestine, from the river to the sea. However, without compromising its rejection of the Zionist entity and without relinquishing any Palestinian rights, Hamas considers the establishment of a fully sovereign and independent Palestinian state, with Jerusalem as its capital along the lines of the 4th of June 1967, with the return of the refugees and the displaced to their homes from which they were expelled, to be a formula of national consensus.

Hamas will not countenance anything short of the complete liberation of Palestinian lands from the “Zionist entity.” But that does not mean it rejects the possibility of a Jewish homeland.

Hamas tacitly recognises the territory of Israel and Palestine as defined the day before the Six Day War.  From a Palestinian perspective, the 1967 Six Day War can be considered the start of the “Zionist entity’s” occupation of the Gaza Strip, West Bank [and East Jerusalem], and the Golan Heights [Syria].

Prior to the Six Day War, Gaza was occupied by Egypt and the West Bank by Jordan. Therefore, preceding the Six Day War, Gaza and the West Bank were part of the Islamic Ummah. Even in Hamas’ “Islamist” view, a “two-state solution” is potentially acceptable.

Regardless of its ultimate wish to establish the global Islamic Ummah, from a political policy perspective, Hamas is willing to consider “the establishment of a fully sovereign and independent Palestinian state, with Jerusalem as its capital along the lines of the 4th of June 1967.” It accepts the possibility that a free Palestinian state could be defined by the “Green Line.”

As many Hamas officials have repeatedly stated, while Hamas theologically and politically opposes a “two-state solution,” this is not an “absolute.” It is open to negotiation in other words. Its declared “enemy” is the “Zionist entity” not the Jews.

All of that said, some element within Hamas clearly do present an “existential threat” to Israelis. So what exactly is Hamas proposing? Is it intent upon the “obliteration” of Israel?

The people of Israel are right to be sceptical. Not least of all because Hamas considers violence to be a legitimate method for achieving “liberation” from the “Zionist entity.” From the 2017 General Principles and Policies we read:

Resisting the occupation with all means and methods is a legitimate right guaranteed by divine laws and by international norms and laws. At the heart of these lies armed resistance, which is regarded as the strategic choice for protecting the principles and the rights of the Palestinian people.

In terms of international law, Palestinians do have the right to “armed resistance.” This does not infer that Hamas has the “right” to attack civilian settlements in their perceived “enemy’s” territory. Despite all Hamas’ talk of “inalienable rights,” no one has the inalienable—or unalienable—right to kill or harm people to get what they want.

The public rhetoric of some Hamas officials has done nothing to assuage Israeli fears. Speaking just a few weeks after the attack on Israel, senior Hamas official and spokesman, Dr Ghazi Hamad, said:

Israel is a country that has no place on our land. We must remove that country, because it constitutes a security, military, and political catastrophe to the Arab and Islamic nation, and must be finished. We are not ashamed to say this, with full force. [. . .] We must teach Israel a lesson, and we will do this again and again. The Al-Aqsa Flood is just the first time, and there will be a second, a third, a fourth, because we have the determination, the resolve, and the capabilities to fight. Will we have to pay a price? Yes, and we are ready to pay it. We are called a nation of martyrs, and we are proud to sacrifice martyrs.

While we do not know the true number of Israeli civilians killed by Hamas’ military—Izz ad-Din Al-Qassam Brigades—during Al-Aqsa Flood, it is difficult to see how any Jewish Israeli, whether they subscribe to the political ideology of Zionism or not, could consider Hamas’ anything but a murderous terrorist organisation.

Currently, Israeli’s have little reason to believe Hamas and the prospect of a “secular” Palestinian government, potentially led by Hamas—an avowedly Islamist organisation—is reason enough for significant Israeli doubt.

Hamas is currently a committed terrorist organisation. That does not mean it always will be. Manifestly, the potential exists that it could eschew violence.

For Gazan’s too, while it was relatively easy for Hamad to suggest the Palestinian people are willing to sacrifice themselves, the suffering heaped on them by Israel’s response to Hamas actions has been horrific. While Hamad is a willing to face suffering himself, having served numerous prison sentences for expressing his political views, it is hard to see how Al-Aqsa Flood did anything to benefit the people of Gaza.

Making Sense of the Ambiguity

The extent to which any of us are responsible for the actions of our governments depends upon your view of the state. If we accept that the existence of the state is valid, then we are each responsible for our individual obedience to it. But that is true in equal measure for all people who recognise the authority of the state.

Hamas has formed the government of Gaza. This no more makes Gazans responsible for the actions of Hamas than it does Israelis, Jewish or otherwise, for the actions of the state of Israel.

Hamas’ official actions and public statements are frequently at odds with its published “policy.” This isn’t anything new or unusual for governments. Israeli politicians keep claiming on the international stage that Israel’s military operations in Gaza and the West Bank aim to “minimise civilian casualties.” It is beyond obvious that this isn’t true.

It is through the lens of Hamad that we can perhaps appreciate how this ambiguity is exploited by both Hamas and Israel.

In 2006, following an Israeli attack that killed 18 Palestinians, Hamad said:

[Israel] is not a country of humans. These are animals and a group of gangs, and this country must be wiped off the face of the earth.

Yet, speaking in 2011, he said:

We [Hamas] accept the state and ’67 borders. This was mentioned many times and we repeated many times. But the question should now be directed to Israel. If [Israel] is ready now to withdraw from the Palestinian territories.

In light of the 2017 Hamas charter, different interpretations can be gleaned from Hamad’s statements. “Israel” means “the Zionist entity.” Removing this entity from “our land” means the Zionist entity must be expelled, at a bare minimum, from Gaza and the West Bank. Claiming that Israel is “not a country of humans” is not a reference to Jews but rather Zionists who are considered by Hamas to be “racist, aggressive, colonial and expansionist.”

In rhetorical terms, Hamad deployed exactly the same dehumanising bile as, for example, Israel’s Minister of Defense, Yoav Gallant, who said “we [the Israeli state] are fighting human animals and we act accordingly.” Just as Hamad suggests Israel should be “wiped off the face of the earth” so, shortly after Al-Aqsa Flood, Israel’s prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu gave a national TV address, in which he said:

You must remember what Amalek has done to you, says our Holy Bible — we do remember.

There was nothing ambiguous about Netanyahu’s biblical reference. According to the first Book of Samuel, the prophet tells King Saul that God has commanded him to massacre the Amalekites. Samuel orders King Saul:

Now go, attack the Amalekites and totally destroy all that belongs to them. Do not spare them; put to death men and women, children and infants, cattle and sheep, camels and donkeys.

The Israeli “War Cabinet,” commanding the “war,” has made no distinction between Hamas and ordinary Palestinians. It dehumanised every Palestinian man, women and child. It’s current offensive cannot be described simply as a war against Hamas. It appears to constitute collective punishment. The most senior Israeli commanders plainly want all Palestinians to be perceived as both culpable for Al-Aqsa Flood and sub-human. Influential Zionists certainly do hold Palestinians “collectively responsible for the actions” of their government.

At the most basic level Al-Aqsa Flood has been exploited by hardliners in Israel who wish to exterminate Palestinians or see them exiled from what remains of Palestine. Similarly, the comments of Hamad and other senior Hamas officials consistently raise the specter of “obliterating” Israel.

The tragic reality is that there is a path to a negotiated settlement. It would require the people of Israel to reject the “Zionist entity” in their midst and Palestinians to both accept the presence of a Jewish state, in some form, and actively stand against the violent rhetoric of Islamist fundamentalists. This is not impossible, but neither the Zionists nor Hamas interests are presently served by such a compromise.

Despite high profile assassinations and significant military losses, Hamas is not at risk of being destroyed by the Israel’s military operation. While the destruction in Gaza is appalling, Hamas remains financially and, though degraded, militarily intact.

Whatever other military objectives Hamas had, Israel’s response to Al-Aqsa Flood has hardened Arab opinions, with more leaning towards “armed resistance.” This bolsters Hamas support in Gaza, in wider Palestine and internationally. Sadly, it also provides a rationale for those within Hamas who advocate violence and strengthens them politically.

Again, Islamist fundamentalists in Hamas are not particularly threatened by Israel’s military operation. In many respects, they benefit from the indiscriminate killing of Palestinians.

Regardless of legal “right of resistance,” and irrespective of the apparent complicity of the Israeli state, or elements within the Israeli state, nothing Hamas did on 7th October can be legitimately claimed to be “right.” But what is morally right, or wrong, rarely has any impact upon realpolitik.

In short, the myth—and it is a myth—that Hamas, in its entirety, is completely unwilling to accept any form of two-state solution, or any other model of a “Jewish homeland,” and wishes to obliterate Israel is useful for both ultra-Zionists in Israel and Islamist extremists in Hamas. It suits those on both sides who wish to perpetuate war, rule by division and spread their political and religious ideologies, seemingly at any cost.

Moderate and calm voices capable of influencing both the Israeli state’s Zionist government and Hamas, are desperately needed.

Following Hamas 7th October Attack the Israel Democracy Institute conducted and published a survey of Israeli public opinion. When asked if Israel should negotiate a two-state solution to the conflict 35.7% of Jews and 54.6% of Palestinian Israelis stated that it should. Similar research conducted by the Palestinian center fro Policy and Survey Research (PSR) noted that backing for Hamas had grown but also that “support for the two-state solution” had also marginally increased among Palestinians.

The will already exists for a negotiated settlement. The alternative is perpetual war and, almost inevitably, further destabilisation of the entire Middle East.

You can read more of Iain’s work at his blog IainDavis.com (Formerly InThisTogether) or on UK Column or follow him on Twitter or subscribe to his SubStack. His new book Pseudopandemic, is now available, in both in kindle and paperback, from Amazon and other sellers. Or you can claim a free copy by subscribing to his newsletter.