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The Pragmatic Dimension of the Palestinian Hamas: A Network Perspective
Abstract
New York and President Bush's "war on terrorism," it is important to try to understand the cultural, political, and social dimensions of such radical Islamic groups as the Palestinian Hamas. Within political and academic circles in the Western world, it is common to portray Islamic movements in categorical terms that utilize binary classifications that mark real or imaginary social attributes rather than relational patterns. 1 Much of this perception derives from the violence accompanying Islamic reli-gious fervor and the fanaticism marking some of its groups and regimes, raising fears of "a clash of civilizations" and "a threat" to Western liberal democratic values and social order. 2 Hamas, an abbreviation of Harakat al-Muqawama al-Islamiyya (Is-lamic Resistance Movement), did not escape the binary perception, and has been described solely as a movement identified with Islamic funda-mentalism and suicide bombings. The objectives at the top of its agenda are the liberation of Palestine through a holy war (jihad) against Israel, establishing an Islamic state on its soil, and reforming society in the spirit of true Islam. It is this Islamic vision, combined with its nationalist claims and militancy toward Israel, that accounts for the prevailing image of Hamas as a rigid movement, ready to pursue its goals at any cost, with no limits or constraints. Islamic and national zeal, bitter opposition to the SHAUL MISHAL teaches at the Department of Political Science at Tel Aviv University, where his research focuses on Arab and Palestinian politics. He has published several books on topics related to radical Islam, Palestinian and Arab politics and societies, and the Arab-Israeli conflict. He also founded and directed the Center for Israeli Arab Studies, which focuses on the Arab society and culture in Israel.
... There is a prolific writing on Hamas movement. Since its establishment in December 1987, studies have been written over the last four decades, analyzing, inter alia: the historical background of the movement (Abu-Amr, 1993); its charter and rigid Islamic ideology (Maqdsi, 1993; Nusse, 2012); its internal structure (Tamimi, 2007); its adjustments to political developments within the Palestinian arena (Mishal, 2003); its rivalry with Fatah (Schanzer, 2008); its capabilities compared to other terror organizations, for instance, Hezbollah (Gleis & Berti, 2012); and the possibility of Hamas as a partner for peace agreement (O'Donnell, 2008). ...
Using contemporary theories on Status Quo and Revisionist actors, the study provides an alternative explanation to the Israeli−Hamas conflict. Israel is a status quo actor that enjoys high values in terms of economic and military power. It has low value in terms of brokerage in international institutions. Hamas is a radical revisionist actor that follows other radical revisionist Islamic actors. However, it fails on both axes to change its equation with Israel. This situation encourages a split within Hamas, between radical revisionists and positionalist revisionists who emphasize compromises with Israel to improve the economy in Gaza and local military capacity.
... Siehe beispielsweiseEl-Said (1995),Mishal (2003),Walther (2009) oder auch ganz aktuellFreer (2018). ...
Die Dissertation nimmt es sich zum Ziel, ein systemtheoretisches Angebot zur Erklärung der Persistenz, also der langfristigen Selbsterhaltung islamistischer Bewegungen in der Region des Nahen Ostens zu machen. Im Rahmen der grundsätzlich komparativ angelegten Analyse wer-den sowohl die palästinensische Hamas als auch die libanesische Hisbollah als Fälle zur sys-temtheoretischen Rekonstruktion gewählt.
... However, Hamas's behavior in the aftermath of its 2007 takeover of the Gaza Strip indicated that Hamas had chosen to use violence against Fatah and NGOs, journalists, and citizens who opposed its rule in Gaza (Berti, 2015). Generally speaking, Hamas operates in a context of opportunities and constraints, conflicting interests, and cost-benefit considerations, and is cognizant of power relations and political feasibility (Mishal, 2003). ...
Understanding the motivations, intentions, and capabilities of terror organizations is highly important to understanding and assessing the risk they present, and to implement effective counter-terror measures. Currently, research of terror organizations consists of designated areas such as economy, security, cyber, and media. Despite ample research on the psychology of the individual terrorist, research regarding the terror organization as a group entity is scarce. The present paper thus presents an exploratory typology, based on both individual and group psychology, which is designed to provide a psychological assessment of terror organizations. Applying a deductive thematic analysis approach, the profiles of three terror organizations: Hezbollah, Hamas, and IS, were analyzed using a five-dimension typology. The data relating to the three organizations was based on two main sources. First, academic journals and official releases by Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs), and second, official publications in Arabic by the organizations themselves. Results show different profiles for the three organizations in terms of their psychological maturity. We propose that different approaches to countering terrorism may be considered based on each organization's unique profile.
... As Gaza was then under Egyptian rule, Palestinian factions in the coastal enclave were not allowed to take part in Egyptian political life and, therefore, rates of militancy -seen as the only means of political communication -were greater (see Rosefsky Wickham 2013). In the 2000s, Hamas looked to Lebanon's Hezbollah for a working model of a successful Islamic political party as well as a militant Islamist group that balances its political, charitable and military activities (Chehab 2007;Levitt 2006;Mishal 2003;Tamimi 2007;Milton-Edwards and Farrell 2010;McGeough 2009). 5 Thus, the EU assumes the same position as the US and Israel in refusing point blank to enter into a dialogue with a national unity government that includes Hamas' elected members. ...
This article contributes to the debate on liminality within International Relations (IR) theory by focusing on the actorness of the European Union (EU) and Hamas. The concept of liminality as a transitional process is applied to frame the situation of both the EU and Hamas as political actors in-between socially established categories. This article explores how the liminal identity of these two actors impacts, on the one hand, their relations with each other and, on the other hand, their relations of ‘self’. Exploring the procedural relations of the EU and Hamas, it argues for the necessity of recognising liminal categories in IR theory and practice, while, at the same time, it highlights the limits of such in-between categories in a world order still structured around the state.
11 Eylül 2001’de teröristlerin New York’taki Dünya Ticaret Merkezi’ne ve Washington DC’deki Pentagon’a saldırısı, yeni bir dönemin başlangıcı olduğu yönündeki yorumları kuvvetlendirmiştir. 11 Eylül etkisi ve teknolojik, ekonomik alandaki bir dizi değişim devletlerin mücadele alanlarını farklı bir alana taşırken, geleneksel savaş algısında da dönüşüm yaşanmıştır. Dolayısıyla 21. yüzyılda savaş ve terörizm, uluslararası meselelerinde artan bir güç uygulamakta ve uluslararası güvenliğin istikrarsızlaşmasının kaynakları olarak kabul edilmektedir. Bu bağlamda “Yeni savaş” kavramı uluslararası ilişkiler gündeminde bulunmakta ve terörizmde bu süreç içerisinde yeni bir yöne doğru evrilmektedir. Bu çalışmada, yeni savaş kavramı ve terörizmin küresel bazda oynadığı kalıcı rolü açıklamak için uluslararası ilişkiler tarihindeki gelişim süreci, dönüşümü ve önemli anları yeniden ele almayı amaçlamaktadır. Yapılan tespitler ve ulaşılan sonuç yeni savaş kavramı içinde terörizm olgusunun sürekliliği ile ilgilidir. Farklı sınır çatışmaları ve uluslararası anlaşmazlıklar da göstermektedir ki terörizm farklı sorunları besleyecek ana faktörler arasındadır. Yeni savaş kavramında olduğu gibi terörizmin birçok alanda farklı parametrelerle incelenmesi de gerekmektedir.
This study argues that a political reality of a temporary arrangement has been solidified in Judea and Samaria since 2005, right after Abu Mazen was elected to be the President. It based on integrative approach suggests here for the first time and falls between the political peace process and the armed struggle approaches as a possible solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. This is a result of social-political change within the Palestinian society: the Palestinian Authority has been concerned about maintaining its civil achievements since 2007, based on Fayyad’s program of building Palestinian statehood from the “bottom up.”Israel has used to deepen its security and settlement hold on the ground.This situation guarantees continuation of Israeli political and security dominance in this region; one de facto political entity is being settled between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River, where two distinctly different communities are living side by side.
This study distinguishes between three Interrelated theoretical approaches prevalent in writings of researchers seeking to understand the emergence of the Islamic Resistance Movement, "Hamas". The first of these approaches examines the movement from the portal of ideology, stressing the importance of international and regional dimensions and the rise of political Islam after the "setback" (Naksa) of the 1967 Six Day War. The second approaches Hamas as representing a social movement seeking to revisit the historical narrative of Palestinian society. The third considers it to be the heir of the Palestinian national liberation movement, attributing its rise to transformations witnessed in Palestinian identity and the Palestinian community's definition of itself. Although the three readings do not contradict each other, a focus on one of them can lead to oversimplification or exaggeration: emphasis on the first approach is at risk of overlooking transformations in the movement in its later stages and a marginalization at the micro level of local dimensions; emphasis on the second approach can result in the overestimation of the effectiveness of collective action; exaggerated emphasis on the third approach deprives social actors of their effectiveness. Hence this study proposes situating Hamas in the intersection of these three approaches.
Bu çalışmada, sistem düzeyinde 2006 Filistin seçiminden sonraki ilk dört yıllık iktidar döneminde (2006-2010) HAMAS’ın seçim zaferinin uluslararası toplumun HAMAS’a bakışının HAMAS’a ne yönde etkisinin olduğu incelenmektedir. Bu bağlamda HAMAS’a bakışta dışlama ve dâhil etme yaklaşımı ele alınmıştır. HAMAS’ın da 2006 seçimlerinden sonraki ilk dört yılda küresel izolasyondan çıkmanın yollarını araştırmakta olduğu görülmektedir. Dışlama ve dâhil etme yaklaşımlarında süreci etkileyen faktörler ve öğrenen örgüt niteliği göz önüne alındığında HAMAS’ın yaşadıklarından edindiği deneyimler ve esnekliği sayesinde, oluşan duruma uygun şekilde pozisyon alıp söylem ve eylemini bu doğrultuda geliştirdiğinden yola çıkarak, dışlamanın radikalizmi körüklerken dâhil etmenin HAMAS’ın söylemlerinde siyasî ifadelerin şiddet ifadelerine oranla daha fazla yer alması ve rakibiyle koalisyon kurma girişimlerinde bulunmasına yola açtığı; dâhil etme noktasında belirleyici faktörün ise HAMAS’ın şiddeti tamamen bırakması olduğu görülmektedir.
Hamas is an organization that has blended the historical and ideological legacy of Muslim Brotherhood (Ikhwan) that has spread all over the Arab world with the sui generis living characteristics of the Palestinian people. Having such legacy and characteristics, Hamas has been considering Palestinian resistance as a religious obligation and struggling against Israel in the front line stating that the occupied territories cannot be abandoned since the day it emerged in 1987. The group has become one of the principal actors regarding the Palestinian question. Hence, Hamas has been one of the most significant non-state actors in the region. From this point, this study first addresses the Ikhwan past of Hamas. Then, the sui generis living conditions of Palestine under occupation that produced Hamas are scrutinized. Meanwhile, the study clarifies the organizational structure and main features of Hamas by paying attention to its rivalry with Fatah.
The conflict between Israelis and Palestines cannot be resolved unless there is some agreement about its origins. This book traces the history of the Palestinians from the Ottoman Empire to the present and argues that anti-Zionism fused the Palestinians into a nation, and nationality and hostility have long been inextricably linked. The book traces the fortunes of the people of Palestine during the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire, the trauma of World War I, the transfer to British authority, the growth in Jewish immigration and finally the creation of the Jewish National State. It was in response to these violent upheavals and threats that the Palestinians, once a disparate group of peasant farmers began to develop a strong national consciousness. That consciousness was born out of anti-Zionism and thus made acceptance of the Jewish presence a denial of Palestinian nationhood. However, the authors sense that a new generation of Palestinian leader may be more willing to come to terms with Israel.
The development of negotiation theory over recent decades has been organized around two major paradigms: bargaining and problem solving. For the bargaining paradigm, indicators of flexibility include concession rates, initiation of new proposals, and other soft behaviors. For the problem-solving perspective, flexibility is usually indicated by a search for better, mutually beneficial solutions to problems that satisfy the needs, identities, and interests of all parties. Empirical research generally reveals that bargaining behaviors are used more frequently in international negotiations than is problem solving. This may be explained by the dominance of the realist paradigm of international relations, within which most diplomats are socialized. Since diplomats generally construct their image of negotiations in terms of bargaining, it is hardly surprising that these behaviors should be prevalent in actual negotiations. In addition, empirical research methods utilized to study negotiations tend to emphasize bargaining variables, and more subtle problem-solving behaviors are more difficult to detect. The empirical prevalence of bargaining, however, does not imply that it is the best method to induce flexibility in international negotiations. On the contrary, most research tends to reveal that problem solving produces greater flexibility and more frequent, efficient, equitable, and durable agreements than bargaining does.
Conflict resolution processes exist in every society. However, a comparison between Western and Middle Eastern procedures of dispute resolution processes reveals different assumptions,underline each approach. The comparison is based on the analysis of two case studies, the first case study is a description of dispute settlement process between Christians and Druze in an Arab village in Israel (mediated by Muslims). The second case study describes a collaborative problem solving process implemented in Cleveland, Ohio in a community,racial conflict. Distinctive cultural and professional assumptions that underlie both intervention processes are identified. Also, it is noted that the third party roles and the main outcomes,which were achieved in both cases were different. Two sets of principles and concepts, which can be applied interchangeablyin both Middle Eastern and Western settings, and those which are unique to each context, are explored. Full Text: COPYRIGHT 1996 American Journal ofEconomics and Sociology, Inc. I
