Abstract
This article analyzes the articulation of the doctrine of “Jihad of the Sword” and martyrdom by the Islamic Resistance Movement of Palestine, Hamas, as a central pillar of Palestinian identity and as a major source of political mobilization and national empowerment. As part of this concept Hamas presents martyrdom as the epitome of jihad and of Islamic belief. The end-goal of jihad is the destruction of Israel and the elimination of the Jews. By emphasizing the centrality of “Jihad of the Sword” Hamas's ideas reveal a certain similarity to, or inspiration by, radical Salafi-jihadist Islamic movements. While Hamas adopted a pragmatic approach on short-term tactics, these doctrines impose constraints on the scope of a profound ideological transformation it can undergo.
Notes
1. “The Hamas Charter.” Available at http://www.mideastweb.org/hamas.htm
2. On the birth and political history of Hamas, see Shaul Mishal and Avraham Sela, The Palestinian Hamas: Vision, Violence, and Coexistence (New York: Columbia University Press, 2000); Ziyad Abu Amr, Islamic Fundamentalism in the West Bank and Gaza (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1994); Hisham H. Ahmad, From Religious Salvation to Political Transformation: The Rise of Hamas in Palestinian Society (Jerusalem: PASIA, 1994); Zaki Chehab, Inside Hamas: The Untold Story of Militants, Martyrs and Spies (London: I. B. Tauris, 2007).
3. For Banna's concept of Jihad, see Richard Mitchell, The Society of the Muslim Brotherhood (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1969), pp. 215–216. During the early 1940s, Banna sanctioned the formation of the “secret apparatus” (al-jihaz al-sirri) that was engaged in terrorist activities in Egypt and of the “Battalions of Jihad” (Kata'ib al-jihad) that later waged a guerilla war against British forces in the Suez Canal area.
4. Amnon Cohen, Political Parties in the West Bank under the Jordanian Regime, 1949–1967 (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1982), p. 205.
5. “Kata'ib al-shahid ‘Izz al-Din al-Qassam—al-nash'a.” Available at http://www.alqassam.ps/arabic/?action=us (November 2007). On the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, see Meir Hatina, Islam and Salvation in Palestine: The Islamic Jihad Movement (Tel Aviv: Moshe Dayan Center for Middle Eastern and African Studies, 2001).
6. Hamas publishes at least four magazines and newspapers: The London-based monthly Filastin al-Muslima was the oldest; al-Risala daily in the Gaza Strip; al-Fatih magazine intended for children and Majallat Qassamiyun, organ of the ‘Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigade (see http://www.alqassam.ps/arabic/books.php). In addition Hamas sponsors three websites: Most important is the Palestinian Information Center (http://www.palestine-info.info), which appears in seven languages. The Arabic-language site offers sections on a variety of issues from Land and Heritage; Jerusalem and al-Aqsa Mosque; Martyrs; Jurisprudential Problems; the Palestine Problem; official statements; and published books. The book section alone provides links to over 20 Hamas books and booklets on various aspects of the movement's positions. The website of the ‘Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigade has a special section for the jurisprudence of jihad (fiqh al-jihad) that contains (as of November 2009) 8 books and booklets as well as over 80 articles (http://www.alqassam.ps/arabic/fiqih.php?from=1). The website's Books and Publications section provides links to over 30 publications addressing various aspects of the Hamas ideology including titles such as Kitab al-ijtihad fi talab al-jihad (The Book Reasoning in the search of Jihad); al-jihad fi sabil Allah (Jihad in the Path of God), and Nihayat Isra'il wal-Wilayat al-Muttahida (The End of Israel and of the USA). It also contains more than 11 booklets commemorating leading Hamas martyrs. The website (http://www.rapeta.org/default.asp) of the Palestine Scholars League (Rabitat ‘Ulama’ Filastin) affiliated with Hamas has a special section (abhath) dedicated to questions related to jihad and political issues. The religious ruling section (fatawa) contains several rulings related to jihad.
7. For its terrorist and political activity, see Mishal and Sela, The Palestinian Hamas, pp. 49–146; Matthew Levitt, Hamas: Politics, Charity, and Terrorism in the Service of Jihad (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2006).
8. For this worldview, see Mark Jurgensmeyer, Terror in the Mind of God: The Global Rise of Religious Violence (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2000), pp. 145ff; David Zeidan, “The Islamic Fundamentalist View of Life as a Perennial Battle,” Middle East Review of International Affairs 5(4) (2001); Bernard Lewis, “The Roots of Muslim Rage,” The Atlantic Monthly (September 1990), pp. 47–60.
9. Ibrahim Quqa to al-Anba’ (Kuwait), 8 October 1988; “Hiwar shamil ma‘a qiyadat Hamas,” Filastin al-Muslima (Hereafter, FM), April 1990; “Shi‘arat harakat al-muqawama al-Islamiyya Hamas,” Ila Filastin, February 1990; “Haqiqat sira‘una ma'a al-yahud,” Nida’ al-Aqsa, January 1989. For a more detailed analysis of Hamas's view of the conflict, see Meir Litvak, “The Islamization of the Israeli-Arab Conflict: the Case of Hamas,” Middle Eastern Studies 23(1) (1998), pp. 148–163.
10. FM, October 1988; Ahmad Muhammad Bahr in al-Risala, 17 March 2005; Dr. Yusuf Musa Rizqa, “Falsafat al-mudafa‘a,” available at www.Palestine-info.info; al-Risala, 4 November 2004.
11. Muhammad Ahmad al-Rashid, “al-Ta'sil al-shar‘i li-jihad harakat Hamas,” available at www.Palestine-info.info; Yunus al-Astal in al-Risala, 23 December 2004; Dr. Khalid al-Khalidi, “Jihad al-Islamiyyin fi filastin,” available at www.Palestine-info.info; “Mashru‘iyat al-jihad al-jima‘i,” available at http://www.alqassam.ps/arabic/fiqih.php?id=34 (accessed August 2008).
12. On the current views of jihad, see Shmuel Bar, “Jihad Ideology in Light of Contemporary Fatwas,” Hudson Institute Research Monographs on the Muslim World, Series 1, Paper no. 1 (August 2006), p. 7.
13. Rudolph Peters, Jihad in Classical and Modern Islam (Princeton, NJ: Marcus Wienner, 1996), pp. 3–4; R. K. Pruthi (ed.), Encyclopaedia of Jihad (New Delhi: Anmol Publications, 2002), Vol I: “Types of Jihad,” pp. 57–71.
14. Rashid, “al-Ta'sil al-shar‘i”; Hamas Charter, article 15.
15. Hamas Charter, articles 15, 28; Hamas Communiqué No. 65, October 1990.
16. Hamas Charter, articles 14 and 15; “The Influence of the Legacy of Global Jihad on Hamas,” Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center: Special Information Bulletin, November 2004. Available at http://www.intelligence.org.il/eng/sib/11_04/legacy.htm. On ‘Azzam's ideas, see Quintan Wiktorowicz, “The New Global Threat: Transnational Salafis and Jihad,” Middle East Policy 8(4) (2001), pp. 18–38.
17. Ibn Taymiyya, al-Fatawa al-Kubra (Beirut: Dar al-Arqam, 1999), Vol. 4, pp. 607–610 cited in Meir Hatina, “Theology and Power in the Middle East: Palestinian Martyrdom in a Comparative Perspective,” Journal of Political Ideologies 10(3) (2005), p. 246.
18. Bahr in al-Risala, 3 April 2003; Idem., al-Risala, 26 June 2003; Idem., al-Risala, 17 March 2005; Astal in al-Risala, 23 December 2004; Khalid Yunus al-Khalidi in al-Risala, 24 February 2005.
19. For ample examples of this appropriation, see “The Influence of the Legacy of Global Jihad on Hamas”; “al-Dhikra,” FM, December 1994.
20. See, “Min al-shahid sayyid qutb ila al-mutanaqilin ‘an al-jihad.” Available at http://www.alqassam.ps/arabic/fiqih.php?id=28 (accessed June 2009).
21. Al-Ahram Weekly, 13–19 August 2009. For a discussion of the rivalry between Hamas and the Salafis, see “Al-Qaeda Confronts Hamas: Divisions in the Sunni Jihadist Movement and its Implications for U.S. Policy,” Studies in Conflict and Terrorism 32(7) (July 2009), pp. 576–590. For an analysis of affinities between the two trends, see Guilain Denoeux, “The Forgotten Swamp: Navigating Political Islam,” Middle East Policy 9(2) (June 2002), pp. 72–78.
22. Al-Rashid, “al-Ta'sil al-shar'i”; Hamas Communiqué dated 1 August 2001 in Yonah Alexander, ed., Palestinian Religious Terrorism: Hamas and Islamic Jihad (Ardsley: Transnational Publishers Inc., 2002), p. 115.
23. Al-Rashid, “al-Ta'sil al-shar‘i,” Salah al-Khalidi, “Filastin ard al-ribat wal-jihad wal-husm,” FM, August 1993. On Palestine's sanctity in the ideology of Hamas, see Meir Litvak, “The Islamization of Palestinian Identity, the Case of Hamas,” Nationalism and Ethnic Politics 2(4) (1996), pp. 500–522.
24. Ibrahim al-‘Ali, “Hawla al-‘amaliyat al-istishhadiyya,” pt. 1, FM, October 1995; “Fi Rihab Aya,” al-Risala, 4 November, 2004; Bahr in al-Risala, 18 November 2003. For the traditional view, see David Cook, Martyrdom in Islam (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), pp. 31–44.
25. Bahr, al-Risala, 17 March 2005; Legislative Council Member “Umm Nidal” Farhat to Saudi Iqra TV, on 19 February 2006—Middle East Media Research Institute [Memri], Special Dispatch No. 1111, 10 March 2006. On the use of this pejorative regarding the Jews, see Bernard Lewis, The Jews of Islam (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1987), p. 36; Aluma Skolnick, “Based on Koranic Verses, Interpretations, and Traditions, Muslim Clerics State: The Jews Are the Descendants of Apes, Pigs, And Other Animals,” Memri, Special Report—No. 11, 1 November 2002.
26. Rizqa, “Falsafat al-mudafa‘a”; al-Rashid, “al-Ta'sil al-shar‘i”; Bahr in al-Risala, 17 March 2005.
27. Al-Risala, 11 October 2001. On this approach, which regards offensive jihad as essentially defensive, see Bassam Tibi, The Challenge of Fundamentalism: Political Islam and the New World Disorder (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2002), pp. 54–55.
28. Bahr, al-Risala, 17 March 2005.
29. Hamas Charter, article 31. Islamic law guarantees security of life and property as well as religious freedom to those who surrender to its rule peacefully. See similar statements by Hamas founder and leader, Ahmad Yasin and others in al-Safir, 31 July; Stern, 7 August; al-Musawwar, 8 August; al-Dustur, 17 August; Jerusalem Post, 17 October 1997.
30. For the agreement, see W. Montgomery Watt, “al-Hudaybiyya,” The Encyclopedia of Islam (Leiden: Brill, e-book).
31. Al-Rashid, “al-Ta'sil al-shar‘i.”
32. Hamas Charter, articles 11, 13; “Wathiqa lil-ta'rikh,” FM, September 1989; “Harakat al-muqawama al-Islamiyya Hamas: hadha huwa mawqifuna min al-taswiyya,” FM, July 1991; Communiques nos. 8, 28, 30.
33. Rabitat ‘Ulama’ Filastin, “Fatawa ‘ulama’ filastin wa-‘ulama’ al-umma al-islamiyya fi umur hamma tata‘llaqu bil-qadiyya al-filastiniyya,” 28 June 2008. Available at http://www.rapeta.org/fatwadetails.asp?ID=116; Salman al-‘Awda, “Nazra shar‘iyya: hukm al-shar‘ fi mu‘ahadat al-salam ma‘a al-yahdu.” Available at http://www.alqassam.ps/arabic/fiqih.php?id=23 (accessed August 2008).
34. Muhammad Siyam to Ila Filastin, May 1990; Bahr in al-Risala, 18 December 2003; Khalid al-Khalidi, “Jihad al-Islamiyyin fi filastin.”
35. Rabitat ‘Ulama’ Filastin, “al-‘amaliyat al-istishadiyya: min a‘zam anwa‘ al-jihad fi sabil Allah.” Available at http://www.palestine-info.info/arabic/fatawa/alfatawa/olamafalasten.htm, 5 May 2001.
36. Yasin to FM, March 1989; Sawt al-Aqsa, 15 January 1990, Ila Filastin, February 1990; Communiques nos. 13, 14, 16, 22, 29 and 31.
37. Hamas Charter, articles, 7, 9, 13; Communique no. 82; al-Rashid, “al-Ta'sil al-shar‘i”; ‘Abd al-Hafiz ‘Alawi, “Filastin al-thawabit,” FM, March 1995.
38. Hamas Charter, articles 6, 9, 15 and 33; “Wathiqa lil-ta'rikh,” FM, September 1989; Communique no. 25.
39. Rantisi to al-Hayat, 23 April 1997; Khalidi in al-Risala, 24 February 2005.
40. The Hamas Charter, articles 14, 15; “Wathiqa lil-ta'rikh,” in FM, September 1989.
41. “Al-Intifada al-mutamayyiza,” FM, 1989; “Hiwar shamil ma'a qiyadat Hamas,” FM, April, May 1990; Ibrahim Ghusha, to al-’Alam, 26 October 1991; Bahr in al-Risala, 18 December 2003.
42. Rashid, “al-Ta'sil al-shar'i.”
43. La Stampa, (Turin), 14 October 2000 (DR).
44. Yasin to La Stampa, 14 October 2000; Elie Rekhess and Meir Litvak, “Palestinian Affairs,” Middle East Contemporary Survey 1997 (Boulder: Westview Press, 1999), p. 203; “Basha'ir al-mustaqbal wa-intisar al-muslimin ‘ala al-yahud.” Available at http://www.alqassam.ps/arabic/fiqih.php?id = 24 (accessed August 2008).
45. Hatina, “Theology and Power,” p. 250.
46. Hasan al-Banna, “Risalat al-Jihad,” in (no editor) Majmu‘at Rasa'il al-Imam al-Shahid (Beirut: s.n., 1970), p. 264, cited in Hatina, “Theology and Power,” p. 241.
47. For an analysis of these concepts, see Cook, Martyrdom; “Shahāda,” Encyclopedia of Islam (Second Edition), Vol. VI, p. 613.
48. “Al-Shahada,” in Anon, ed., al-Shahada wa-makanat al-shuhada’ fi filastin (N.P., N.D.). Available at http://www.palestine-info.net/arabic/spfiles/suhada_2005/makanat/suhada05.htm (accessed 28 November 2007); Bahr in al-Risala, 17 March 2005.
49. Anat Kurz and Nahman Tal, “Hamas: Radical Islam in a National Struggle,” Jaffee Center for Strategic Studies: Memorandum No. 48, July 1997; Yoram Schweitzer, “Palestinian Istishhadia: A Developing Instrument,” Studies in Conflict & Terrorism 30(8) (2007), p. 670.
50. For an incisive analysis of suicide attacks as a source of national empowerment, see Meir Hatina, ‘The ‘Ulama’ and the Cult of Death in Palestine’, Israel Affairs, 12(1) (2006), pp. 29–51.
51. Rantisi, “Thaqafat al-shahada” in al-Shahada wa-makanat al-shuhada’ fi filastin; Rantisi to al-Mujtama‘, 21 September 2001.
52. Abu Muhammad Mustafa to Mashad Khorasan, 22 August 2001; Maha ‘Abd al-Hadi in FM, September 2001; Anon, ‘Kata'ib al-Qassam tafrudu twazun al-ra‘b ‘ala al-‘adu al-sahyuni, FM, November 2001, Yasin and Zahhar to FM, November 2001; FM, March 2001, which dedicated most of its pages to the glorification of suicide attacks; Rantisi, “Thaqafat al-shahada.”
53. Usama Hamdan to al-Manar TV, 29 August 2005. Available at http://www.memritv.org/search.asp?ACT=S9&P1=820
54. Mash‘al to al-Majd, 15 January 2001; Rantisi to al-Sharq al-Awsat, 3 February 2001; Yasin to al-Dustur, 29 September and to FM, November 2001.
55. Rizqa, “Falsafat al-mudafa'a”; Yasin to FM, November 2001. See also, Isma‘il Sa‘id Ramadan, who describes martyrdom as “self purification,” in “al-Shahada Bawabat masjid al-Aqsa,” al-Shahada wa-makanat al-shuhada’; and Rantisi's statement, “those who love death will defeat those who are afraid of it,” in “Thaqafat al-shahada.”
56. See Franz Rosenthal, “On Suicide in Islam,” in idem, Muslim Intellectual and Social History (Aldershot: Variorum, 1990), pp. 239–259.
57. For these rulings, and the debate that ensued in the Arab world, see Haim Malka, “Must Innocents Die? The Islamic Debate over Suicide Attacks,” Middle East Quarterly 10(2) (2003), pp. 19–28; Yotam Feldner, “Debating the Religious, Political and Moral Legitimacy of Suicide Bombings,” MEMRI Inquiry and Analysis Series, No. 53, 2 May 2001. Tantawi issued conflicting rulings on this issue, see “Jihad Against the U.S.: Al-Azhar's Conflicting Fatwas,” Memri, Special Dispatch Series, No. 480, 16 March 2003.
58. Among these clerics and thinkers were: The Sudan Authority of Clerics (Hay'at ‘ulama’ al-Sudan); The Association of Islamic Jurisprudence in Sudan (Majma‘ al-fiqh al-Islami); Shaykh Ibrahim Al al-Shaykh, former Mufti of Saudi Arabia; and Shaykh ‘Abdallah bin Muni‘, member of the Supreme Council of Clerics in Saudi Arabia. Among the non-establishment thinkers, most prominent were the Egyptian Shaykh Yusuf al-Qaradawi, who apparently serves as Hamas's supreme religious authority and shaykh ‘Abdallah bin Muhammad al-Sayf, Mufti of the Mujahidun in Chechnia.
59. FM, May 1996. See also the series of articles that seek to prove the religious basis of martyrdom “Hawla al-‘amaliyat al-istishhadiyya,” FM, October, November, December 1996.
60. For a few among the many such articles, see Ibrahim al-‘Ali in FM, October–December 1995. See eulogies in Hamas's official website, www.palestine-info.com, as well as in al-Fatih no. 1 (September 2002) to no. 112 (November 2007); Hamas Al-Aqsa TV, 6–13 April 2007—Memri, Special Dispatch Series, No. 1577, 9 May 2007; Memritv.org, Clip No. 1497, 29 June 2007.
61. Al-Sharq al-Awsat, 5 June 2002. It is totally irrelevant whether or not the mother truly believed in her statement or was forced to pronounce it. What matters is the message that Hamas wished to convey.
62. Al-Hayat al-Jadida, 17 August 2001; al-Risala, 11 October 2001; Rizqa, “Falsafat al-mudafa‘a;’ Sa'id Ridwan, ‘al-Shahada: bawabat masjid al-Aqsa” in al-Shahada wa-makanat al-shuhada’; Khalidi, al-Risala, 24 February 2005; Bahr in al-Risala, 24 July, 18 November 2003.
63. Al-Hayat al-Jadida, 11 September 2001; USA Today, 26 June 2001; www.memri.org, Inquiry and Analysis Series, No. 74, 30 October 2001. On Sharabi's statement, see Hisham Sharabi, Neopatriarchy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1988), pp. 32–33.
64. Eli Alshech, “Egoistic Martyrdom and Hamas Success in the 2005 Municipal Elections: A Study of Hamas Martyrs’ Ethical Wills, Biographies, and Eulogies,” Die Welt des Islams 48 (2008), p. 32.
65. On this episode, see R. Geoffrey Jensen, “Jose Millan-Astray and the Nationalist ‘Crusade’ in Spain,” Journal of Contemporary History 27(3) (1992), pp. 425–447.
66. For a different view on Islamists and Fascism, see David A. Charters, “Something Old, Something New …? Al Qaeda, Jihadism, and Fascism,” Terrorism and Political Violence 19 (2007), pp. 65–93.
67. Hamas Charter, articles 13, 9, and 7; Hamas Communique no. 82. According to Islamic tradition the Jews will flee from the Muslims on that day and “when the Jew will hide behind stones and trees. The stones and trees will say O Moslems, O ‘Abdulla (slave of God), there is a Jew behind me, come and kill him. Only the Gharkad tree, (saltbush) would not do that because it is one of the trees of the Jews.”
68. Shaykh Muhammad al-‘Arifi, al-Aqsa TV, 12 September 2008. Available at www.memritv.org, clip no. 1867.
69. Cited in Livnat Holtzman and Eliezer Schlossberg, “The Modern Religious Polemic between Muslims and Jews as Reflected in the Book Haqaiq Quraniyya Hawla al-Qadiyya al-Filastiniyya,” Historia 10 (2002) (Hebrew), p. 156.
70. Al-Risala, 23 April 2007; al-Fatih, No. 8. Available at www.al-fateh.net
71. The “supplications” to God to exterminate the Jews and Christians are articulated by numerous Islamist spokesmen in the Middle East, so much so that Kuwaiti Minister of Religious Endowments, Ahmad Baqir, and Deputy Saudi Minister for Religious Affairs, ‘Abd al-’Aziz al-’Ammar, urged their cessation, see www.islamonline.net/Arabic/news 30 April and 15 May 2002; al-Sharq al-Awsat, 29 December 2002.
72. Shaul Mishal, “The Pragmatic Dimension of the Palestinian Hamas: A Network Perspective,” Armed Forces & Society 29(4) (Summer 2003), p. 570.
73. For a small sample, see Azzam Tamimi, Hamas: Unwritten Chapters (London: Hurst & Co., 2007); Menachem Klein, “Hamas in Power,” The Middle East Journal 61(3) (Summer 2007), pp. 442–459; Khaled Hroub, “A ‘New Hamas’ through Its New Documents,” Journal of Palestine Studies 35(4) (Summer 2006), pp. 6–27; Mishal, “The Pragmatic Dimension.”
74. For a sample of such statements, see Al-Wasat, 1 November 1993; Yasin to FM, March 1995; Khalid Mash‘al to al-Majd, 15 January 2001; Zahar to al-Dustur, 19 February; Yasin to al-Dustur, 29 September 2001; Klein, “Hamas in Power,” pp. 454–455; “What Hamas Really Wants,” Le Monde Diplomatique, January 2007; Isma‘il Haniyya to Reuters, 22 January 2007; Mash‘al to NYT, 5 May 2009.
75. For an analysis of this concept, see Ehud Yaari, “The Muqawama Doctrine,” Jerusalem Report, 13 November 2006. For statements of Hamas spokesmen along these lines, see Ahmad Bahr, “al-Muqawama hiyya al-tariq al-wahid li-tahrir filastin.” Available at http://www.alqassam.ps/arabic/dialogue.php?id=186 (accessed June 2009); Ismail Ridwan, “al-Muqawama khiyruna al-istratiji wal-asasi lil-difa ‘wal-tahrir.” Available at http://www.alqassam.ps/arabic/dialogue.php?id= 200 (accessed June 2009); Yusuf Farahat, “Tahrir filastin bata qariban wal-muqawama hiyya khiyar al-sha‘b.” Available at http://www.alqassam.ps/arabic/dialogue.php?id=195 (accessed June 2009).
76. Khalid Mash‘al to Al-Jazeera TV on April 25, 2008. Available at Memritv.org, Clip No. 1750, 25 April 2008. See also Mushir al-Masri to al-Risala, 31 May 2007.
77. Ha'aretz, 5, 11, 13 June; al-Sharq al-Awsat, 17 June; FM, July 1995; Mahmud al-Zahhar to Al-Manar TV, 25 January 2006. Available at memritv.org, clip no. 1014, 25 January 2006; al-Risala, 2, 19 April 2007.