Question:
Discuss about the Terrorist Group Case Study for Hamas Organization.
Hamas was originated in the Muslim Brotherhood Movement of Egypt. The legal registration of the organization took place in Israel in the year 1978. This group was established in the year 1987. In the year 1988, opposed the existence of Israel and published the Islamic Covenant (Gerges 2010).
The location of operation for Hamas Organization is Palestinian Territories. In modern day, Hamas operates in Iran and Syria. The Hamas Organization is a large militant Islamic group of Palestine. The Islamic Resistance Movement has the Arabic acronym of Hamas (Gerges 2010).
The Hamas Organization had a short-term as well as long-term goal. The short-term goal of the Hamas Organization was to free Palestine as well as modern-day Israel from the occupation of Israel (Berti 2015).The long-term aim of Hamas Organization was to focus on the establishment of an Islamic state from the River of Jordan extending to the Mediterranean Sea (Gerges 2010).
One myth that is selected from Dr. Gary Lafree’s 9 myths related to terrorism is the myth that every corner of the world is affected terror attack.
This myth is not applicable to Hamas Organization because terrorist attack of Hamas organization is concentrated geographically. In the timeframe of June 2004 to July 2014, the organization has killed 26 civilians and two foreign nationals in Israel by using mortar fire and Palestinian rockets. The organization has attacked soldiers and civilians of Israel to create the state of Islamic Palestine in between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea (Adamson 2016).
The Hamas Organization believes that Palestine is a kingdom that is endowed to Palestinians by God. The organization has strong ideology and goal to establish a Sunni Islamic State in entire Palestine region. They plan to free Palestine from the occupation of Israel. The leaders of Hamas Organization have claimed to accept a truce with Israel; the organization wants to accept the truce only if voters of Palestine approve the withdrawal of Israel to the pre-1967 borders and a Palestine state can be developed in certain parts of Palestine. However, the people of Gaza consider the Hamas Organization responsible for fostering law and order in Gaza after the organization won the election. The Organization has adopted a religious ideology and philosophy of Nationalism towards Palestine (Sayigh 2010).
Individual grievances like the grievance against the Western world, the wide gap between the poor and rich, the urban and rural section of the society have influenced many people to be a part of the recruitment process of the Hamas Organization. The organization have played an instrumental role to target the individual grievance of children and students and influenced them to join the Hamas Organization. The Palestine women are often afflicted with adverse conditions and the Hamas Organization influences these women and civilians of Palestine to join and support the Hamas Organization. The Organization engages in charitable activities in Palestine and also aims to free Palestine from Israel, both these strategies impact the recruitment process of the Hamas Organization (Roy 2013).
It is important to analyze the organization structure of the Hamas organization to understand the way this organization conducts its operational activities. The organization has a government based in Gaza and political bureau with a foreign base. The leaders of Hamas Organization have contradictory opinions about the fact whether the military wing of the organization functions under the guidance of the political wing or operates independently.
Political Bureau- It is the principal authority of Hamas Organization. Ismail Haniyeh heads the political bureau of Hamas Organization. In the year 2017, Yahya Sinwar who is a member of the armed wing of the group got the opportunity to replace Ismail Haniyeh because he won the election conducted internally. He will replace Ismail to be the leader of the Hamas Organization (Yousef 2011).
Gaza Government-The Hamas government in Gaza elected Ismail Haniyeh who served as the former prime minister of the group. In the year 2014, Rami Hamdallah was elected as the new prime minister of the Hamas government. In the month of September of the year 2017, the Hamas Organization made the announcement for the dissolving its government in the Gaza. This decision was in agreement with the decision of Palestinian Authority (PA) to conduct elections of the parliament in the Gaza strip and West Bank (Bhasin and Hallward 2013).
Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigade-This is the military wing of the Hamas Organization. The Brigades conducted suicide bombings and other attacks of terror under the leadership of Mohammad Deif. Thus it is evident that the Hamas Organization has a structure of different divisions like the military wing, political wing and the Gaza government. However, a clear line of separation between the political and the military wing of the Hamas Organization is not existent (Bhasin and Hallward 2013).
The strategic logic of Hamas Organization is to liberate the territories of Palestine from the occupation of Israel. The organization focuses on launching rockets and suicide bombers to pursue their goal. Hamas operates a military wing and runs a political wing as well as network of social service
The Strategy that is best applicable to the Hamas Organization is the strategy of Intimidation. The Hamas Organization tried to persuade Israel that they are more powerful than Israel and waged war against Israel to free Palestine from occupancy of Israel. The organization conducted air-strikes, fired rockets and conducted suicide bombings to kill civilians of Israel (Kardelj 2010).
The Hamas Organization adopted the tactics of conducting terror activities against Israel but the organization also performed religious and charitable deeds in Palestine because of which the organization received support from many countries across the globe, for instance, the Middle East countries(Aljamal 2016).The organization conducts activities to raise funds to support its terrorist and administrative functions. The organization receives training from Iran; activities to raise funds are conducted in North America and Europe and depend on Palestine for donation. The organization adopts tactics of delivery of weapons through tunnel, conducts suicide bombings and fires rockets targeting mosques, schools and colleges (Walther 2010).
The Hamas Organization engaged in a War with Israel that continued for 50 days. The Hamas Organization in Gaza was accountable for firing around 4500 mortars and rockets in Israel. The organization engaged in indiscriminate firing of rockets because of which the civilians had to find place for shelter to protect themselves and their children. Israel defended them in the war actively and passively. The organization adopts the strategy to target industrial parks, Defense Ministry Facilities, ports, water plants, hoses, shopping malls and schools to cause mass casualties. The Hamas Organizations possessed more than 10,000 rockets which they stole from arsenals in Libya. Also, Iran and Syria supplied these long-range to Hamas Organization. The naval ships of Iran were involved in delivery of weapons to the ports of Sudan and Syria, smuggling takes place from these ports to the Egypt-Gaza border and tunnels are used to deliver weapons to Hamas Organization. The organization also took help of the strategy of suicide bombings, car bombings, and airstrikes to kill civilians (Kardelj 2010).
Hamas Organization adopts practices of intimidation and censorship against reporters of international media. The Foreign Press Association has condemned Hamas Organization for using unorthodox methods to restrict the visit of international journalists in Gaza. The organization has prepared a black-list with names of journalists they wanted to restrict visiting Gaza .It has been reported by the Times of Israel that Hamas Organization often threatened journalists who took photographs of the organization. The Hamas Organization is known for implementing manipulative methods against media during the Operation Protective Edge. The organization pushed the media to narrate a story helpless Palestinians. The Hamas Organization has disrupted the journalists; distorted photographs published in media and deceived the media to achieve this objective. Levitt discusses the media structure of Hamas Organization in which he mentions the significant role that the media Jihad and New Media Jihad plays to radicalize the Palestinian society. The Hamas organization focused on organization of public campaign and used the media to win elections in the past.
The Hamas Organization targets kindergartens in Gaza to manipulate the tender mind of children so that they can be supporters and soldiers of the organization in future. The University of Gaza conducted a survey in April 2001 and found that the recruitment process of Hamas Organization is striking. 49 % of children in the age group of 9-16 have participated in the recruitment process of the Hamas Organization, 73 percent of children wanted to become martyrs (Roy 2013). The Hamas Organization markets itself as a social welfare group and thus receives financial aid from many Middle Eastern countries. The organization has independent charitable and political wings and markets itself on charitable ground because of which it receives logistical and financial support from many countries. The Hamas Organization focuses on technical areas of marketing while organizing marketing activities like public campaigns. The organization analyzes the objectives, the message, the infrastructure and the target audience while marketing itself on potential media. The Internet publications, the print media provide important marketing platform for the Hamas Organization (Mozes and Weimann 2010). For instance, the Alaqsa channel is known for broadcasting messages of the Hamas organization during the Israeli Airstrikes.
Conclusion
The Hamas Organization can be countered by the process of Intelligence Analysis. The collection and analysis of information about the Hamas organization is important to understand the activities of the organization. It is important to develop a surveillance wing to study the activities of the Hamas Organization. Intelligent apparatus should be developed which can be used to combat terror attacks of the Hamas Organization. The threats of the Hamas organization should be identified and classified into threats which are immediate and require special attention to be combated. The operations of military and paramilitary group of a country play a vital role in disrupting the infrastructure of the Hamas Organization. The security of commercial aviation plays an important role to combat the terror attack of the Hamas organization. The countries should adopt mechanism of defense against the biological and chemical attacks of the Hamas Organization. The countries like Israel where the Hamas Organization conducted terror attacks must put efforts to enhance the psychological endurance of the civilians of the country. The civilians of these countries should be provided with special security especially in mosques, schools, colleges and churches. The Hamas Organization also targets young mind of children to influence them to join the organization. Thus countries should create awareness so that the parents observe the activities of their children and prevent them from getting influenced by any terror group. The media like newspapers, radio, and internet media should be used to create awareness and psychological endurance against the Hamas Organization.
For instance, the Israel group conducted attack on the Hamas Organization in the year 2014. Two Hamas posts located on the Northern strips of Gaza were targeted by the Air Force of Israel. The F-35 fighter jets were used in the strike organized by Israel against Hamas Organization. The Operation Protective Edge was conducted by the Hamas Organization which witnessed the launching of hundreds of projectiles, mortars and rockets from by the Hamas organization towards Israel. The Hamas organization is solely responsible for the civilians and soldiers and since then Israel has adopted suitable measures to combat the terror group, the Hamas Organization.
Reference Lists
Adamson, D.L., 2016. Son of Hamas.
Aljamal, Y.M., 2016. HAMAS: A TERRORIST ORGANIZATION OR LIBERATION MOVEMENT?. Politics and Religion Journal, 8(1), pp.39-58.
Berti, B., 2015. Non-state actors as providers of governance: The Hamas government in Gaza between effective sovereignty, centralized authority, and resistance. The Middle East Journal, 69(1), pp.9-31.
Bhasin, T. and Hallward, M.C., 2013. Hamas as a political party: democratization in the Palestinian territories. Terrorism and political violence, 25(1), pp.75-93.
Gerges, F.A., 2010. The transformation of Hamas. Nation Company.
Kardelj, N., 2010. Israel Vs. Hamas. Nova Science Publishers.
Mozes, T. and Weimann, G., 2010. The e-marketing strategy of Hamas. Studies in Conflict & Terrorism, 33(3), pp.211-225.
Roy, S., 2013. Hamas and civil society in Gaza: Engaging the Islamist social sector. Princeton University Press.
Sayigh, Y., 2010. Hamas rule in Gaza: three years on. Middle East Brief, 41.
Walther, M.A., 2010. Hamas between violence and pragmatism. BoD–Books on Demand.
Yousef, M.H., 2011. Son of Hamas: A gripping account of terror, betrayal, political intrigue, and unthinkable choices. Tyndale House Publishers, Inc..
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