What's New in Hamas's Document

by Dr. Abdul-Sattar Kassem

Various media outlets spoke of a new document for Hamas, and all we could do was wait for its announcement, which happened on May 1, 2017, from the mouth of Mr. Khaled Meshaal. I noticed the vast gap between the media leaks and the actual document. The media leaks went far in their speculation about Hamas’s concessions regarding the Palestinian cause, giving the impression that the Hamas movement was racing the PLO in relinquishing the Palestinian cause.

But the picture appeared different after reading the document’s provisions. The document did not violate Palestinian taboos, did not contradict Palestinian fixed principles, and did not diminish the fixed national rights of the Palestinian people.

There is something new in Hamas’s document regarding only two matters:

1. The preamble of the document, which Mr. Meshaal delivered, shows philosophical and intellectual maturity, and for the first time I heard the leader of a Palestinian faction speak with logic, knowledge, and philosophy, abandoning theatrics and hollow slogans. Meshaal spoke academically about the necessity of renewal in thought and culture, because monotony extended over a long period of time plants stereotype, ossification, and dullness in people’s hearts, and the human being turns, through the path of creativity, into an idol-worshipper of the past.

It is clear that peoples who do not monitor developments in their surroundings and environment cannot make the necessary developments that keep them at the level of the times, and consequently cannot avoid the risks resulting from temporal disconnection. Peoples are not supposed to lag behind the times, and what keeps them from doing so is their ability to keep pace with developments in various fields of life, and to take appropriate measures to ward off harm. Mr. Meshaal explained his argument well.

2. Religious extremism was subjected to reassessment, such that the document stipulated a distinction between Jews and Zionists, and that Islam is a religion of harmony, love, peace, and tolerance, and that fanaticism, racism, and indiscriminate killing have nothing to do with Islam. This leads us to believe the document is directed primarily at Arabs and Muslims who have strayed far in their religious extremism, justifying killing, bloodshed, and the enslavement of women.

Some controversy revolves around clause twenty of the document, which stipulates Hamas’s agreement to establishing a Palestinian state on the territory occupied in ‘67, provided there is no recognition of Israel and the Palestinian refugees return.

Some considered this clause a first step toward recognizing Israel and joining the PLO’s caravan of squandering national rights. But this Hamas-style agreement to such a state is not new — Hamas had previously announced its readiness to accept a Palestinian state on the territory occupied in ‘67 without recognizing Israel, and had previously put forward its own initiative for establishing a ten-year truce with Israel, but without recognizing Israel. Of course, this proposal is futile and cannot be accepted by Israel and the Western states supporting it. If Israel refuses to establish a Palestinian state for an authority that recognizes it, coordinates security matters with it, and does not push toward the refugees’ return, how could it possibly establish a state for one who refuses to recognize it?

It was not wise for Hamas to raise this topic in its document, knowing in advance that the path before its proposal is entirely closed. This is part of an old Palestinian problem: repeatedly putting forward initiatives they themselves are unable to implement, and that others are unwilling to accept.

This clause does not mean Hamas is putting forward an initiative — it means Hamas will not object if the negotiating process with Israel produces a Palestinian state within the June 4 borders. Here Meshaal was successful in clarifying, in that reality might produce a solution of this kind, and logic does not call for rejecting it. But Meshaal was not successful when he described negotiation as a “mechanism” without clearly explaining when it could be used. It is true negotiating with Israel constitutes a form of bargaining, and bargaining over Palestinian rights is not acceptable as a matter of principle.

Arabs collectively rejected negotiating with Israel as a matter of principle, and did not accept direct bilateral negotiations until they became certain there was no backing to protect their principle. It should have been clarified that negotiation does not constitute an option except when Israel becomes unable to refuse restoring rights to their owners.

As for the reaction of the so-called international community to this new document, it is not expected to be accepted or engaged with, because it offers nothing new consistent with this community’s conditions. Here we must be cautious in dealing with the idea of the international community, because the United States, some of Western Europe, and Israel confine the international community to themselves. The Hamas document is not a settlement initiative — it is more akin to a constitutional document for the Hamas movement, designed to be one of the movement’s intellectual pillars. What it is most keen on is bringing the movement out of monopolistic, totalizing thought into humanistic thought that sees the world with broad horizons.

The only flaw I detected in the document is that it did not address the contradiction with the movement’s 1988 charter. There is a discrepancy between the document’s provisions and the charter’s provisions, and the clash between them will occur one day — so what is the solution? The charter should have been amended first to align with the document, so the movement could avoid a future legal dispute.

Source: Translated from the original Arabic, “الجديد في وثيقة حماس” by Dr. Abdul-Sattar Kassem.