Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, December 1998, pages 23-24

Personality

Palestinian Islamist Azzam Tamimi Defines Hamas, PLO Differences and Calls for Dialogue With Both

By Grace Halsell

“Time is not on Israel’s side, but rather with those who resist Israel,” declares Azzam Tamimi, a native of Hebron and chairman of Liberty for the Muslim World, a London-based organization promoting human rights and democracy in the Muslim world.

In Washington to participate in a Jerusalem Fund-sponsored conference on “The Legitimacy of Resistance,” Dr. Tamimi told the Washington Report that “the Zionist project” in Palestine will fail for at least three reasons:

“First, there’s the demographics. The Israelis murder a father. But he has six to ten sons who replace him. Palestinians have large families, the Jews do not. And Israel is running out of Jews. They wanted to bring all the Jews of the world to Palestine. But no more Jews want to go to Palestine. Even the Russian Jews who came to Israel are still hoping to get to America. Now a large portion of Israelis have dual nationalities. Maybe a million Jews have dual Israeli-American citizenship. And a huge number of South African Jews hold two passports. They are ready to flee the Jewish state at any moment. They did not go there to live in constant conflict. For them, the Jewish state has become the most dangerous place in the world for a Jew. This will become increasingly apparent.

“Secondly, Israel depends not on itself, but on a superpower. The Israelis are spoiled. The United States has given them a high standard of living. And a huge military arsenal. Now Israel is totally dependent on handouts—in the billions. But the superpower has its own problems. More than 16 percent of Americans live in poverty. Americans won’t be interested in supporting a Zionist regime forever. And, moreover, America won’t be a superpower forever. Look what happened to Russia.”

As a third reason, Tamimi points to the moral and financial support given by Arabs and Muslims to the Palestinian resistance movement of Hamas, an acronym meaning “enthusiasm” or “zeal.” An example of solidarity, he says, was expressed by the manner in which Arab leaders received Hamas founder Sheikh Ahmad Yassin earlier this year after his release from nine years of Israeli imprisonment. Sheikh Yassin’s September 1997 release was part of a Jordan-Israeli deal concluded in the aftermath of the Mossad’s failed assassination attempt in Amman on the life of Khaled Meshal, head of the Hamas political department.

In April of this year, after making the religious pilgrimage to Mecca, the sheikh met with leaders in Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Sudan, Yemen, Syria and Iran. “The hajj presented a golden opportunity for someone like him to receive invitations from so many Arab capitals and to talk to people—not only about Hamas, but to talk to them about the Palestinian problem because what Sheikh Yassin represents is a symbol of Palestinian resistance, rather than just one faction within Palestine. This is what distinguishes him from anybody else. His presence does not mean a partisan affair. That is why he was met with a sort of veneration and respect. His visits came at a time when the governments and people were becoming increasingly frustrated with the peace process. The way in which they received him and the statements they made gave greater legitimacy to Palestinian armed resistance as exemplified by Hamas.”

Tamimi, whose father was a resistance fighter in the 1940s against the Zionist invaders of Palestine, said there were two main differences between the PLO and Hamas. “The PLO operated outside. Instructions, directives, appointments, policies—everything came from outside. Then leaders of the Palestinian Authority (PA) came from outside. Hamas is domestic, it’s local, it’s well entrenched in the society. The second difference: the PLO and the PA are more interested in improving the lifestyles of their VIPs. They’ve become corrupt. But no one has ever heard of any corruption in the institutions that belong to Hamas or that sympathize with Hamas. And this is because of the ethical or religious element.”

The World His Bailiwick

Typical of many Palestinians whose land was occupied by Zionists, Tamimi has learned to call the world his bailiwick. Born in 1955, he was seven when his family moved from Hebron to Kuwait. After high school graduation, he moved to England and the University of Westminster, London. First studying pure science, he changed to politics, earning a Ph.D., with a thesis on “Islam and Democracy.”

Later in Jordan, he organized and was administrator of offices designed to assist the 26 Islamists who won parliamentary seats in a 1989 election. “We had committees of volunteers and specialists that operated parallel to the committees in parliament—such as foreign affairs, agriculture, civil liberties and so on.” After two years, he again returned to Britain, where he became co-founder and chairman of Liberty for the Muslim World, which monitors human rights and democratization. “Our message is that there can never be respect for human rights unless there is proper democratization. And there can never be a solution to the political crisis in the region unless there is political reform.” His group organizes conferences and seminars—as well as publishing books—on such issues as power sharing, pluralism, political legitimacy and secularism.

“We strongly advocate dialogue between Islamists and the West. Many in the West are surprised to learn that Islamist movements such as Hamas and democracy are compatible. Those who claim otherwise lack understanding of the nature of Islam and the historical development of the Muslims’ approach to the question of governance. Islam includes faraghat, that is, space. It allows for areas in which we as human beings act in accordance with the respective needs and exigencies of time and place. Due to this provision for space, there is flexibility in which Muslims can devise suitable solutions for emerging problems.”

A Desired Compatibility

Asked why there were so few examples of the compatibility between Islam and democracy, Tamimi said, “This is not because the people don’t want it. Look at Algeria. In a 1991 election the people indicated they wanted representatives of Islamic values. The army claimed that if these Islamists came to power, they’d cancel democracy. But of course those who canceled democracy were those who canceled the elections. Then there was the example of Jordanians democratically electing 26 Islamists to parliament. But sadly this democratization has been diminishing, fading. It fell victim to the peace process. The Jordanian monarch feared more democracy, more freedom of speech, might result in the people expressing their opposition to the peace process.” The United States, he added, does not foster democracy in the Middle East. Rather, “it endorses halting the democratization in Jordan, Egypt, Tunisia, Algeria and the Palestinian territories.”

Hamas, Tamimi continued, “is more democratic than any of the secular movements in the Arab world. Our leadership is elected. The executive bodies—those who lead the movement and are in charge of the various institutions—are all chosen democratically. As far as envisioning political life in the future, in a liberated Palestine, Hamas has expressly said that a democratic sort of system would be installed because this is in line with Islam. Politically, Hamas belongs to the mainstream Islamic channel—that is, committed to the compatibility of Islam and democracy.”

As to an organizational chart, while Sheikh Yassin is Hamas’ spiritual leader, he is more of a symbol. On the working level, Hamas has a civilian as well as military branch called Regiments of Izz-al Din al-Qassam, so named for an early leader of the Palestinian armed resistance. “The military wing of Hamas has a head, has its own way of appointing its commanders and recruiting its members. This happens in a different manner than appointments in the civilian sector. Much of this is known only to those who function within this apparatus.”

In the civilian sector, Hamas has schools, hospitals and other social services. “Let’s say they set up an orphanage. There is a committee elected. And when it is elected, it elects a head. The committee supervises the project, which is run by an administrator who may be appointed. We distinguish between a body that supervises—this body belongs to the movement—and the institution and its administrator that operate according to normal administrative procedures. The supervising committee is equivalent to having a board of trustees. They don’t run the organization but they have powers to intervene, to change policies.”

“We have the right to resist.”

And where does Hamas get its money? “In the West, this question generally is raised to create suspicion,” Tamimi said. While Israel today puts pressure on Washington to prevent money from any source in the U.S. getting to Hamas, Israel had a different agenda originally. Initially, it saw the PLO as the enemy. And, in its determination to undermine the PLO, Israel supported Hamas, financially as well as by other means. After co-opting the PLO, Israel then saw Hamas as the enemy. As for its monetary requirements today, Hamas, Tamimi said, does not possess a complicated or extensive bureaucracy, which means that its financial responsibilities are considerably less than the PLO budget.

For its day-to-day operations, “Hamas enjoys the support of millions of Muslims around the world. If Hamas wants to collect funds for any project, it does not find it difficult to do so. Again, let me distinguish between two aspects: the military effort and the civilian effort. All the civilian activities are done through institutions. And these institutions are recognized by the authorities—both the Israeli and the Palestinian. This is something the West generally does not understand: that Israel actually recognizes the existence of these institutions and considers them to be legal. Because nothing these institutions do is illegal—even according to Israeli law. Actually these institutions are indispensable. If the Israelis or the PA cancel Palestinians’ rights of free speech, the people might keep silent, but cancel their bread and they will riot in the streets.”

Tamimi pointed out that Hamas’ social service institutions, being legal, can go public and raise funds. “There’s no problem about this. They go to various Arab and Muslim countries and raise funds. And these funds support orphanages, schools and hospitals.

“As far as the military effort is concerned, it does not require much funding. What do you need, really? What sort of weapons does Hamas use? It’s the human being. The courage of one man. It’s the most valuable of resources. As for some of the operations, the suicidal operations, they require volunteers but the cost in money is near zero. The bomb-making technique is available to everybody. It’s on the Internet and the material is available in any corner shop that sells fertilizers. Therefore there’s no big deal, really. If you want to do something, you do it. Israel has no defense against Hamas. The more they kill, the more the people want to die. It was Rabin who said, ‘What can you do about someone who is willing to kill himself?’

“Moreover, if Hamas wants weapons, they are there,” Tamimi continued. “The Palestinian society now is highly militarized. Almost everybody has a piece of armament or more in Palestine. Also it’s easy to buy from Israeli soldiers, many of whom are addicted to drugs. It’s easy to buy from other sources, and sometimes you can buy very cheaply. But what is required militarily by Hamas is very little and is generally exaggerated in the media.

“Until now, Hamas has not felt the time has come to wage a full-scale war against Israel. It will take place when the Muslims and Arabs join forces. But meanwhile, we have to show signs of resistance. If Israel attacks civilians, Hamas may feel compelled to attack civilians. If Jewish settlers attack Palestinians, Hamas may attack Jewish settlers. We have the right to resist. This resistance is an extension of an old tradition that goes back to the struggle against British and Zionist colonialism.”

The same justification for resistance, Tamimi added, had, prior to the emergence of Hamas in December 1987, been endorsed by the Arab League, the Islamic Conference Organization, the Non-Aligned Movement and the United Nations. “Armed resistance is not an aberration from the norm. The Oslo agreement between the PLO and Israel is the aberration.”

Hamas, he concluded, “is a constant reminder to the Palestinian people that the Zionist project is doomed. It’s a large—but cowardly—endeavor. The entire theft of a nation was a cowardly undertaking. What Jew can be proud of it? Already,” he adds, “we are witnessing the beginning of the end of the Zionist project.”