Israel Created Two of Its Own Worst Enemies—Hamas and Hezbollah
The decade of the 1980s saw the emergence of two of Israel’s most militant Islamic foes, Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in the occupied territories. Hamas is responsible for many of the bloody suicide bombings which continue to terrorize Israel today. Ironically, both groups came into existence in large part because of unintended consequences of Israel’s actions.
Hamas, meaning zeal, is an acronym for “Harakat al-Muqawama al-Islamiya,” the Islamic Resistance Movement.1 It was founded in the occupied Gaza Strip in 1987 and its charter, which first appeared in February 1988, declared Hamas “the intifada wing of the Muslim Brotherhood (Ikhwan) in Palestine.”2 Hamas was a militant outgrowth of the Muslim Brotherhood, a humanitarian group operating in the Gaza Strip since the 1970s. Devoting itself to grass-roots social work in mosques and civic clinics, the Brotherhood abstained from all forms of anti-occupation struggle.
By 1986 the Brotherhood controlled 40 percent of all the mosques and the 7,000-student Islamic University in Gaza. At the time, Israeli authorities saw the Brotherhood as a counterbalance to the secular PLO and contributed to the Brotherhood’s cause through favors and donations to mosques and schools.3 Israeli donations to the Brotherhood were reported to be in the millions of dollars.4
When Hamas emerged from the Brotherhood, however, it turned out that Israel had helped create an enemy motived not only by the nationalism of the PLO but by the religious fervor of Islam.
Hamas quickly gained support because of its Islamic credentials and the absence of corruption that many attached to PLO officials. Moreover, it dazzled many Palestinians with its daring attacks carried out by its military wing, the Izzidine (Brigade) Qassam, named after a prominent Palestinian Islamic nationalist who was killed by the British in 1935. The brigade was founded in 1990.5
