Understanding Hamas and Why That Matters
Helena Cobban and Rami C Khouri, OR Books, £15.99

WHEN Piers Morgan was inviting every guest to “condemn Hamas” only a few notables, including Norman Finkelstein, declined to take the bait and thus seal the terms of debate before even starting it.

As far as Western discourse was concerned, Hamas were the perverts at the bottom of the seventh circle of hell, sadistic fanatics who took great pleasure in atrocities.

Just World Educational, a small US non-profit educational outfit with a board that includes the authors, decided that this demonisation was a serious obstacle for a political solution and a workable peace. Indeed, in a ruling-class narrative that appears ubiquitous at this present time, when an adversary is evil, diplomacy itself becomes pandering to evil and eradication is the only logical course of action.

By the time you finish this book you wonder if it’s the collective West itself which is actually engaged in the most fervent jihad against the rest of world in terms of what it is allowed to believe. It is desperate for public support. Understanding Hamas is a welcome puncture in that narrative.

The bulk of the book consists of transcripts of the conversations Just World Educational conducted with five independent scholars of the subject, and published as webinars which are available from their website. It is bolstered by six appendices which condense the 1988 and 2017 Hamas “charters,” excerpts from opinion poll research, and explainers both from US sources and Hamas.

Rather than adding unimportant fluff to the text, the conversational approach makes it very easy to read. None of the speakers are reaching for technical terminology and thus the reader isn’t reaching for a dictionary or glossary every other page.

The conversations with Jeroen Gunning and Azzam Tamimi stand out as particularly informative.

Gunning is a Professor of Middle Eastern politics at Kings College London and one of the founders of critical terrorism studies, and makes a number of valuable points.

First, that the “terrorism” discourse strips violence of its political context and allows the delegitimisation of anyone who seeks to put things in context as “misguided at best or a terrorist lover at worst.” It removes political solutions and allows only military solutions. When there are only military solutions for organisations which have grassroots support it “means having to commit genocide to achieve that aim.”

Second, he details the number of times Hamas has actually engaged in non-violent resistance or made overtures. The election of Hamas in 2006 was followed by rejection of a democratic will and the attempt at a coup.

The Great March of Return was violently put down by Israeli snipers, and the 2017 revision of principles was ignored. Approaches to Fatah in the West Bank were equally rebuffed, even though Hamas calls for the release of Fatah leader Marwan Barghouti.

One of Hamas’s top leaders said he learned to negotiate with Israelis in prison. Even when it concerned basic human rights for the prisoners, conditions would not improve until pressure was applied, such as a strike. The lesson learned was that force worked.

Equally, the capture of Gilad Shalit lead to a prisoner exchange with Israel that freed over a thousand Palestinian prisoners.

Tamimi, editor of Al-Hiwar (“Dialogue”) TV channel makes similar observations, but as a Palestinian he adds additional context. Calls to observe international law are made by the same parties who exempt themselves from it. And it depends when you start: “The house from which my mother was driven out in Beersheba in 1948 is my house. And I will still claim that house until my death, and my children and grandchildren will continue to claim that house.”

Equally there are many hypocrisies from the West, and as Rami Khouri paraphrases Hamas: “Let them [Israel] meet the requirements of UN resolutions and then we will do the same.”
Hamas’s 2017 charter recognised a de facto state of Israel if not a de jure one, but no Palestinian state has been recognised by Israel or any Israeli party.

As Tamimi says: “Palestinian hopes, Palestinian aspirations, Palestinian dreams – they don’t exist... I think it is highly unlikely that we will ever reach that situation in which there are two states, one called Palestine and one called Israel. And that’s not because of the Palestinians. It’s because of... the way the zionist project is developing.”

Understanding Hamas quickly provides the reader with the fundamental building blocks for an informed debate. It’s a shame that for the most part the mainstream has drowned this out under a cacophony of atrocity propaganda.