Front Burner - What is Hamas?

Episode Date: October 11, 2023

In today's episode, we take a closer look at Hamas, the militant group behind this weekend’s assault on Israel. How did it end up governing Gaza? What are its origins and its goals? Lawrence Pintak — former CBS News Middle East correspondent and author of five books on religion, media and the Middle East — is our guest. For transcripts of Front Burner, please visit: https://www.cbc.ca/radio/frontburner/transcripts Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday.

In the Dragon's Den, a simple pitch can lead to a life-changing connection. Watch new episodes of Dragon's Den free on CBC Gem. Brought to you in part by National Angel Capital Organization, empowering Canada's entrepreneurs through angel investment and industry connections. This is a CBC Podcast. Hi, I'm Damon Fairless. Today on the show, we've got a primer for you on Hamas. Hamas is, of course, the group that launched the surprise attack on Israel on Saturday, and the group that controls the Palestinian territory of Gaza.

We'll explain their origins, their political beliefs, goals, their use of violence, and why this most recent assault is different. I'm joined by Lawrence Pintak, a former Middle East correspondent for CBS News and the founding dean of the College of Communication at Washington State University. He's also the author of America and Islam, as well as four other books on the intersections of religion, media, and the Middle East. Hi, Lawrence. Thanks so much for coming on FrontBurner today. I'd say my pleasure, but under the circumstances. All right, let's start with the basics here. Can you just briefly sum up what Hamas is and

what their goals are as an organization? Absolutely. When you look at the Palestinian people, the Palestinian movement, you have two main groups. One is the PLO, the old Yasser Arafat organization, and they recognize, they have recognized the right of Israel new children. We want to live in peace with all our neighbors, including the Israelis. They govern the West Bank. The other chunk of Palestinian territory is the Gaza Strip.

West Bank. The other chunk of Palestinian territory is the Gaza Strip. That is administered by Hamas, which is dedicated to the destruction of the state of Israel. And what's Hamas's position in terms of the creation of a Palestinian state? Well, they absolutely want a Palestinian state. They also don't want an Israeli state. So if they had their way, first and foremost, there would be a state on the West Bank and Gaza. But in the long term, that state would encompass Israel proper. I mean, you have to, obviously, you take everything anyone says with a big grain of salt. You're a journalist, you know that. Hamas's position for a very, very long time was get rid of Israel. Now it's the 67 borders, which is the West Bank. Getting rid of

all of those settlements on the West Bank, a critical piece. But most people who know Hamas and understand the internal ideology believe that Hamas would not ultimately be satisfied with that. Now, especially after the attacks of this last weekend, Hamas is mostly known for its military wing. But can you tell me a bit more about the other branches of the organization, what kind of things they do? Absolutely. Hamas is both a social movement and a militant movement. They basically run all of the social services in the Gaza Strip. You have about 2 million people living in an area of land that's about twice the size of Washington, D.C., one of the most densely populated places on earth. And they have been largely under blockade for the last 15, 20 years. Since 2007,

Palestinians in Gaza basically cannot leave except for extingent circumstances that the Israelis have to approve. And so Hamas runs all of the social welfare organizations, the hospitals, the food distribution, because nothing is normal in Gaza because it is under siege. And how long has Hamas been active? Well, they basically came onto the stage in the 80s. But Hamas is an outgrowth of the Muslim Brotherhood, which is essentially a global organization that is dedicated to Islamic rule around the world, first and foremost in the Middle East. And they are very much at odds with many of the Arab governments who don't want, as we saw in Egypt, the government, the military

overturned a Muslim government, a Muslim brotherhood government, because they are the antithesis of what the seculars want. So Hamas emerged from the Muslim Brotherhood and the name is actually an Arabic acronym for Islamic Resistance Movement and they believe in Islamic law. There's a form of Islamic law in place in Gaza now. And then they grew through the 90s. Their leader Sheikh Yassin, the man who formed them, was eventually jailed by the Israelis, but released from prison in 1998. And they let him go around the Middle East raising money. And correct me if I'm wrong, but Yassin was, he was assassinated by Israel several years later. Is that right? He was, absolutely.

So as you're saying, Hamas isn't just an anti-occupation group, but it's also an Islamic fundamentalist group. So how accurate are comparisons between Hamas and say a group like IS or ISIS? Well, IS, as we've seen, is extremely brutal. In terms of imposing Islamic law, you could use an analogy of the Taliban, but in reality right now, the level of Islamic law that they are imposing in Gaza is much, much lighter, shall we say, than in Afghanistan. But ultimately, they are an Islamic movement. So Hamas is the de facto political power in Gaza now, the smaller of two Palestinian territories, as you mentioned. Can you tell me

how that came to be, how it got to be the ruling power there? They were elected. There was an election in 2006. Hamas won the PLO. Then essentially the two came to blows, both on the West Bank and in Gaza, literally firefights between their militias. The PLO was essentially driven out of Gaza. And for the most part, Hamas as a militant group is out of the West Bank. Although most of the world has refused to recognize Hamas as a political structure in Gaza, the group continues struggling to function, insisting that Hamas was democratically chosen by Palestinians to rule. Meanwhile, economic sanctions...

The catch is there hasn't been an election since then in Gaza. Hmm. So what's the relationship between Hamas and PLO, the Palestinian Authority, right now? They have contempt for each other because the PLO does not believe that there can be a military solution to the conflict, whereas Hamas absolutely believes there must be. And can you help me understand what the relationship is between the PLO and the Palestinian Authority and Israel compared to Hamas?

Absolutely. The PLO is the governing organization within the Palestinian Authority. The Palestinian Authority is the government, and the PLO runs that government. By taking over the Palestinian Authority, the PLO is working closely with Israeli authorities to govern the West Bank. And that was their decision that in order for us to have some level of home rule, as it were, we have to work with the Israelis. Which stands in complete comparison to Hamas. Absolutely. So can you tell me the connection between Hamas' rise to power in Gaza and the blockade of Gaza that's enforced by Israel and Egypt?

Certainly. Hamas was elected in 2006. The blockade began in 2007. It's a pretty clear cause and effect. Israel controls everything and everyone that goes out or comes in. The latest commodity to be hit by Israeli sanctions, fuel, be it for cars or for generating power. The Israeli government wants to tighten the screws on Hamas, which seized control of Gaza six months ago. But it's ordinary Palestinians

who are feeling the squeeze. And that blockade is very, very tight. Palestinian, individual Palestinians living in Gaza effectively can't leave the Gaza Strip. They are not allowed to by the Israelis to go through the checkpoints. They have to have some really extingent circumstances or they're employed in Israel. It's important to remember that you have an entire generation in Gaza that has never left this tiny little few dozen square miles. Essentially, all goods and services come from Israel or Egypt. Egypt allowed some goods to move back and forth. Israel allowed some goods to move back and forth. Israel provides the electricity, the power. Israel provides much of the water, all of which has now been cut off in the last couple of days.

So the Palestinians in Gaza are completely dependent on goods and services from outside Gaza. Israel insists there is no humanitarian crisis in Gaza, but the face of its blockade is easy to find in narrow alleyways like this one, heavy and careworn. Some 80% of Gazans rely on UN agencies for food assistance of some sort. Now, there's a network of tunnels under the border along on the Egyptian side that there's always been a nod, nod, wink, wink, where the Egyptians allow things to move through those tunnels, including weapons. And at other times they don't. The current government has been pretty tight on that. And then other goods move from Israel into Gaza, depending on what the security and political situation is. And the current Egyptian government is enforcing the blockade because of the ties, because of the opposition to the Muslim Brotherhood origins of Hamas. Is that correct?

as an extension of that. But of course, all governments in the Middle East are cynical and pragmatic. So at times they will cooperate, at times they won't. In the Dragon's Den, a simple pitch can lead to a life-changing connection. Watch new episodes of Dragon's Den free on CBC Gem. Brought to you in part by National Angel Capital Organization. Empowering Canada's entrepreneurs through angel investment and industry connections. Hi, it's Ramit Sethi here. You may have seen my money show on Netflix. I've been talking about money for 20 years. I've talked to millions of people,

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just search for Money for Couples. This obviously isn't the first time Hamas has used violence. What kind of tactics did they generally use? Well, the most common has been firing missiles, firing rockets from Gaza into Israel proper. But we've also seen individuals getting into Israel through a series of tunnels along the Israeli border or by cutting the fences and attacking individual civilians, military, and a variety of others. And we have, of course, seen the waves of suicide bombings in Jerusalem and in other parts of Israel. And those suicide bombers have come from both Hamas and from a group called Palestinian Islamic Jihad. And some came in from the West Bank, which is an easier

move. The West Bank, you don't have the same kind of security along the borders. And they are able to infiltrate and carry out horrible suicide bombings. And that has then sparked response from Israel, both in the West Bank and in Gaza. But the way that they were able to infiltrate Israel on the ground and by sea and air with individual fighters in the hundreds is unprecedented. They have always been able to get a few fighters in here and there and attack some settlers or shoot up a military post. But it has never been on the scale that we've seen now. This is a quantum change in tactics and a quantum intelligence failure. Now, Hamas has drawn criticism for targeting civilians.

How do they justify that? That their civilians are also being targeted. We could do a whole hour on the number of Palestinians who die both on the West Bank and in Gaza through actions by the Israeli military. So they would point to that as you in the West are using double standards when you say that we're targeting civilians, but you're not condem standards when you say that we're targeting civilians, but you're not condemning Israel for what they see as targeting its civilians. Hamas sees all Israelis as settlers who have taken over the Palestinian lands.

They certainly look at men, virtually every male and many, many women serve in the Israeli armed forces. So by extension, Hamas sees them as, whether they're wearing uniforms or not, they're members of the Israeli armed forces. And all Israelis are, in their view, illegal settlers on Palestinian land. The Canadian government classifies Hamas as a terrorist organization, as does the U.S. and the U.K. Hamas terrorists aren't a resistance. They're not freedom fighters. They are terrorists.

The bloody hands of the terrorist organization Hamas, a group whose stated purpose for being is to kill Jews. They are not militants. They are not freedom fighters. They are terrorists. Does Hamas have any international state supporters? International state supporters are primarily in the Middle East. Hamas was funded by the Saudis as a balance against Iranian influence with Hezbollah, not to get too complicated, in Lebanon. And these days, Qatar is the biggest supporter of Hamas. There are Hamas officials based in Qatar, as well as in Turkey. And more recently, and most interesting in terms of geopolitics, Iran has been involved with Hamas. Can you break that down for me? In terms of Middle East and mostly Muslim politics, it's strange bedfellows. Hamas is a Sunni Muslim organization, as is the rest of the Muslim

Brotherhood. Iran, of course, is a Shiite country. And that is why Iran was close to the Shiites in Lebanon. But because the enemy of my enemy is my friend, in more recent years, they have become very close to and very supportive of Hamas. Okay. So Hamas took power after the 2006 election, which you mentioned, and that was the last time there was an election in Gaza. What's your sense of how much public support Hamas and the PLO are roughly 50-50 in terms of support among the Palestinian people as a whole on the West Bank and Gaza. And most of those surveys were largely on the West Bank, harder to do that in Gaza. But it appears that despite the pretty authoritarian, heavy-handed rule in Gaza, they still have broad support. Israel has said that they've only just started striking Hamas and that, I'm going to quote here, what we'll do to our enemies in the coming days will reverberate with them for generations.

Hamas will understand that by attacking us, they've made a mistake of historic proportions. We will exact a price that will be remembered by them and Israel's other enemies for decades to come. Have things with Hamas always been this combative? There has always been a careful calculation on both parts. Both militaries, both the Hamas militants and the Israeli military, know that there's always going to be tit for tat. Hamas has always known that if they fire rockets into Israel, there is going to be an Israeli response. This is a very different situation.

And it's hard to see how we don't end up with a greater confrontation, a greater conflagration. And the real danger is this becomes regional. Yeah, I guess that's what I was going to ask next is it's obviously volatile and fluid, very dynamic. But given what's been reported so far, what do you think Hamas is trying to achieve with this last weekend's offensive? What's their endgame, do you think? Well, clearly they aren't telling me, but my 40 years of covering the Middle East, I would argue that it would be their hope that they could spark a wider conflagration,

because there is a limited amount that they can do, particularly now. All right, this lightning strike on Saturday, unprecedented, nothing ever seen like it before. But now they're not going to send hundreds of more guys across the border. That's not going to happen. They can keep firing rockets, but they'll run out of rockets at some point. And they know that the Israelis are just going to continue to rain death down on them. Their hope would be that the next phase is somehow Iran gets involved, Hezbollah attacks from the north, which is a real possibility, and then ultimately Israel strikes back at the supporters of Hamas, and particularly Iran.

From there, all bets are off. All right. Lawrence, thank you so much for talking to me today. And thank you. today. And slash podcasts.