Terrorism or Freedom Fighter?

Hamas is an active militant group, but it is also a major political party in Gaza. The goal of Hamas is an Islamic fundamentalist Palestinian state. In the eyes of some, especially its targets, Hamas is seen as a terrorist group, but to the eyes of others, Hamas is seen as a freedom fighter group. There is an argument for both statements, and this is yet another example that proves that terrorism is in the eye of the beholder, and that perspective has a great impact on whether an act is considered terrorism, and whether a person is considered a terrorist or a freedom fighter. In the eyes of many, Hamas is simply a reckless and cruel terrorist organization, but in the eyes of others, Hamas is a group of brave freedom fighters.

There are certain things that are characteristics of a terrorist. A terrorist, or terrorist group, will always use terror and violence as means to an end. In addition, fear is used as a tactic. The death of innocent civilians is almost always inevitable, whether it be purposeful and part of the plan to instill fear, or whether it be a simple side effect of the main goal. Collateral damage is unavoidable. Terrorism, by the definition of some, is almost always politically motivated. Lastly, it is committed usually by non-state actors.

On the other hand, there are certain characteristics that are associated with freedom fighters. A freedom fighter is usually fighting on behalf of a repressed population. The goal of a freedom fighter is to correct historical “wrongs”. A freedom fighter goes to extreme lengths to fight for the people that it is representing. After all, the freedom fighter is fighting for freedom, regardless of if the actor is taking desperate measures.

Hamas is considered a terrorist organization by most of the world. Throughout the years, a large quantity of lives, even innocent lives, has been taken. Several conflicts have occurred, and most of the world does not look at Hamas in a favorable light. Hamas has used cruel tactics. War crimes have been committed by this organization, and countless violations of humanity have as well. While most of the world sees Hamas as a terrorist organization, the following reasons are the reasons why Hamas could be seen as a freedom fighter group.

As mentioned earlier in this post, a freedom fighter will go to great lengths to correct any historical “wrongs”. In the eyes of Hamas, and its supporters, the group is doing exactly that. Palestine “should” be theirs, in their opinion. They were forced out of their land, and suffered being treated poorly in the past. In the eyes of Hamas, and its supporters, the aggressor is technically Israel, and Islam has suffered damages due to Israel. Hamas translates to the word “zeal”, and whether seen as a positive thing, or a negative thing, zeal is something that the group surely possesses.

Bobby Orokos

Reaction Post #2

HAMAS: Religious Wave of Terrorism

After understanding what events took place during the First and Second Intifadas, the actions of both the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) and HAMAS are clearly acts of terrorism.  However, in the case of HAMAS, the instances and reasons for committing such acts are the start to Rapoport’s religious wave of terrorism, in which people united around religion to achieve political goals, such as the establishment of Palestine and liberation from Israel, through the tactical use of terror.  Although the reasons of their cause could be justified, it is there actions that condemn HAMAS a terrorist organization, and therefore its goals against the world.

During the First and Second Intifadas, Palestinians were oppressed and endured much suffering for the goal of independence from Israel.  During the Second Intifada, HAMAS was created as a religious alternative to the Palestinian Liberation Organization, which was a secular organization where progress in their goals was slow.  As a result of the First Intifada, there was 1,000 Palestinian deaths as compared to 164 Israeli deaths, and an additional 3,000 Palestinian deaths compared to 1,000 Israeli deaths during the Second Intifada.  Palestinians were clearly victimized during these times of rebellion, and unleashed this anger into groups such as the PLO and later HAMAS.  Where the PLO was secular, HAMAS gained support by becoming religiously-based to attract more followers.  Although taking an extreme tactic to create a solution to the problems that existed in Palestine and Israel, the goals of righting a historical wrong are acceptable by the Palestinians, but the approach taken to right this historical wrong are unacceptable.

From the perception of people outside of the region of Israel and Palestine, HAMAS and the PLO’s actions have been condemned as terrorist due to their indiscriminate killing of people, targeting of civilians, and use of terror as a strategy to achieve their political goals.  Although having differing goals, both the PLO and HAMAS have done actions worthy of calling them terrorist organizations.  However, where the PLO began to lose support and power was due to the rise of HAMAS during the Second Intifada, where religion became a unifying factor in gathering support for the Palestinian cause.  The goals of both the PLO and HAMAS show, where the PLO is happy to settle for a 2-state solution in which both Israel and Palestine exist, whereas HAMAS is calling for a single Islamic state, which can only be done with the dismemberment of Israel.  This idea of uniting people around a religious goal is effective because it creates a mindset where people question if they are being strong in their faith if they oppose a group that uses their religion as a call to action.

The religious aspect of HAMAS initiated a movement in which terrorist organizations utilize the unity of religion to move their cause forward.  In this case, HAMAS utilized the faith of Islam to unify a solid base against the establishment of Israel as a result of the nation’s past actions. What started as an attempt to right a historical wrong to the Palestinian people turned into a revolutionary practice for terrorist organizations to use religion as a unification.

The evolution of Terrorism

Brady Gambone

03-26-2017

Terrorism is an evolutionary step in a political movement's process to achieve their goals. Terrorism arises when a political movement is not going the way a significant portion of the group wants. When a group is being oppressed for a long period of time, eventually, some, or most of the group will resort to violence to achieve their goals. This can be observed with the PLO and the rise of HAMAS. Political movements start out as nothing more than murmurs. Individuals talking to each other about an idea or problem in the society. Eventually, this evolves into speeches, small protests, books, and media advocacy. However, there are many times when this peaceful process does not work out, or works out fast enough for some members in the group. This is when terrorism arises. Violence and controlled, directed chaos, to shift the balance of the issue and eliminate the other sides support for political issues.

This can be seen in groups such as the PLO, The Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO). The PLO is an organization dedicated to the liberation of Palestine from the country of Israel. They are a self-declared governmental, Islamic religious group. Although they have a standing military that has the capability to cause war, conflict and terror, the PLO is not a terrorist organization. Founded in 1964, the PLO is the self-declared government of Palestine with specific goals to be internationally recognized as a state, and are recently supportive of the two-state solution. However, there is another group, very much like the PLO that takes a much more violent, and drastic approach.

            HAMAS is a terrorist organization that does not support the two-state solution. Currently the self-declared government of the Gaza Strip, HAMAS commits violent acts of terror throughout the region. Regularly launched rocket attacks kill multitudes of military and civilians in Israel and the Gaza Strip every year. These attacks are designed to cause as many casualties as possible, to destroy infrastructure, and to incite fear in the population.

            HAMAS however has only existed sense 1987. Over 20 years after the PLO was founded. It is my belief that over time, individuals in, and outside of the PLO, became aggravated with the PLO for not achieving its goals after 20 years, and formed a more aggressive, violent group to achieve a free state. The PLO was not successful in freeing Palestine, and HAMAS took aggressive action in the hopes to change the tides. The belief that violence achieves what you want is not unheard of. Anarchists were not always violent. In the early 19th century, when Anarchism formed, it was not a solely violent form of protest, but an ideology, that turned violent over time. Terrorism is just another step in the evolution of a political movement, and should be addressed as such. HAMAS rose from the PLO as the next step in the political process. Perhaps terrorisms complete prevention is possible if we address political issues when they first arise, rather than wait, until many see violence as the only answer.

Kennedy Muise

March 26, 2017

Blog Post 2: Problems with PLO

            The Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) was involved in the Arab Israeli Conflict by working towards a two-state solution to separate Palestine and Israel into two sovereign states. While the PLO attempted to accomplish this solution through negotiations, peace-building, cooperation with other Arab states, and setting up a government, under the OSLO Accords, the PLO was rather unsuccessful in creating a stable environment for Palestinians and Jews to coexist. While there may be many issues with the PLO’s methods of stability, the main reason why the PLO was unsuccessful is that it failed to recognize the Muslim community in Palestine.

            One main goal of the PLO was to make Palestine a secular state. In their charter, The PLO recognized the importance of Arab unity in Palestine, and they wanted to protect this identity for every Palestinian, whether they were Muslim, Jewish, Samaritan, etc.; if everyone was united as an Arab, they would not be divided by religion (PLO Charter, Article 12). While this idea of unity seems well and good, the problem is that by creating a secular and unified state, the PLO ignored the customs of the large Muslim population living in Palestine. Muslim communities are used to outwardly expressing their religion, i.e. through traditional hijabs and burkas for women, prayer, chants, etc. While not all customs of Islam are necessarily just at least by western standards, such as burkas, the Muslim community at least deserves a chance to voice their opinions and thoughts in how the new Palestinian government should be set up, seeing that Muslims make up 93% of the population in Palestine (“Are All Palestinians Muslim?”).

            By not addressing the Muslim community directly, the PLO lost support from Palestinian Muslims to Hamas, another organization involved in the conflict. Unlike the PLO, Hamas recognized the values of the Muslim community such as “brotherhood”, jihad, and the importance of Allah over Arab identity. While I agree that the PLO’s idea of unity intended on creating equality amongst all Palestinians, despite their religious affiliation, I think the PLO would have achieved more success in fostering a stable government in Palestine if the PLO had thought of the Muslim community’s values and how to incorporate them into the foundation of the new government through negotiation and public policy.

               In addition, the PLO also lost its success in its attempt to cooperate with other Arab states. Another main goal of the PLO was to mutually work with other Arab states (Class lecture). However, if the PLO did not recognize the Muslim community in Palestine, who is to say they would effectively recognize other Muslim communities in the Arab world? Furthermore, if Palestine did not address the Muslim community, who will ensure that they are acknowledged on a global level, i.e. by the United Nations? In this way, the PLO’s ignorance turns from a domestic issue to a regional issue and even to an international issue. Nonetheless, without recognizing other Muslim communities and/or states, the PLO ran the risk of cooperating ineffectively with other Arab states that have strong Muslim populations, such as Iraq, which furthers the instability of the Palestinian government and ruins its chances for regional and international cooperation.

            The PLO’s failure to create stability in Palestine due to its disregard for Palestinian Muslims can be exemplified through the US involvement in the Middle East, especially Iraq. In general, the US is known for getting involved in the Middle East without acknowledging all the different customs, traditions, and ways of life that are significant in a predominantly Muslim region. In Iraq’s case, it is easy to realize that it is very difficult to create a democracy in a Muslim country due to Muslim customs and Shari’ah law. It is even more difficult for a western country, like the US, to instill the same democratic system in Iraq because US officials have little knowledge about the issues between ethnic and/or religious tensions between the Shias, the Sunnis, and the Kurds living in Iraq. When the US got involved in Iraq, before 2003, it was determined that “Iraq would become a ‘beacon of democracy’” even though the US “orchestrated the invasion [of Iraq]…based on false intelligence” (Hussain). While the US’s intensions may be to create a more democratic and westernized state in the Middle East, it continuously fails to recognize the customs of the Muslim population living in these regions, which causes destabilization and a vacuum for terrorism. Terrorist groups, like ISIS “are born out of destabilization created by Western military intervention” (Hussain). When the Muslim communities feel that their right to religion to taken away, infringed upon, or ignored, they are more likely to fight for their religion and their right to be heard, which is often yet unfortunately expressed through terrorism.

            The example of US intervention in Iraq and its failure to stabilize Iraq is a good example for why the PLO also had problems with stabilizing Palestine. Like the US, the PLO ignored a large portion of its population, leading to the rise of a more radical group, Hamas, which took support away from the PLO. If the PLO had recognized the Muslim community in Palestine, it would have been a much stronger and well-supported organization and could have potentially created a stable two-state solution between Palestine and Israel.

 

 Works Cited

“Are All Palestinians Muslim?”. Institute for Middle East Understanding. 5 Dec. 2005. Web. 26 Mar. 2017.

Hussain, Dilly. “ISIS: The “unintended consequences” of the US-led war on Iraq”. Foreign Policy Journal. 23 Mar. 2015. Web. 26 Mar. 2017.

PLO Charter