Al-Zaytouna Centre is pleased to present this peer-reviewed study, in Arabic, by Wael Abed Elhamid El Mabhouh, entitled “Hamas Between the Charter and the Document: An Overview of the Fundamentals and Tactics.”
This study examines the motivations behind Hamas’s issuance of its 2017 Political Document, while also identifying the similarities and differences between this document and the 1988 Charter. Furthermore, it explores the continuities and transformations in Hamas’s political thought three decades after its establishment.
The study is particularly significant given its timing, as it was conducted shortly after the release of the 2017 Political Document. It offers valuable insights for researchers of Islamic movements, especially Hamas, and contributes to broader scholarship on the Palestine issue.
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Publication Information Arabic – Title: Hamas bayna al-Mithaq wa al-Wathiqah: Qira’ah fi al-Thabit wa al-Mutaghayyir (Hamas Between the Charter and the Document: An Overview of the Fundamentals and Tactics) – Prepared by: Wael Abed Elhamid El Mabhouh – Published in: 2017 – Pages: 65 – Paperback Copy Price: $4 – Soft Copy Price: $0.99 – ISBN: 978-614-494-014-3 |
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Introduction
Hamas issued its Political Document on 1/5/2017 after a lengthy period of anticipation, likely following years of internal deliberations, particularly given the existence of its 1988 Charter. Hamas Political Bureau Chief Khalid Mish‘al stated that the new document “reassures allied and friendly states and enables them to promote the Palestine issue across international forums.” He further argued that the document’s careful wording and balanced approach, combining the fundamentals with flexibility, and openness with adherence to rights, presented the Palestine issue in a manner better suited to gaining broader regional and international support.
Fahmi Huwaydi views the document as introducing “new formulations rather than necessarily new positions.” He argues that it primarily addresses the international community in its own language, while emphasizing that it does not replace the 1988 Charter. Rather, he maintains that Hamas seeks to engage with political transformations while preserving its fundamental positions
By contrast, Hasan Nafaa argues that the document “came too late” and reflected implicit acknowledgment of past mistakes as well as a response to internal, regional and international pressures. In his view, the revisions to Hamas’s charter and principles resulted from external and internal pressures rather than from a genuine intellectual evolution within the movement. He questions whether such ideological development could have emerged suddenly, arguing that if the document represented true intellectual maturation, it would have been issued much earlier and under different circumstances.
Majid Kayyali argues that the main observation is that Hamas’s new document did not constitute a break either with its original Charter, issued at the outset of the First Intifada in 1987, or with its identity as an Islamic movement and a component of the broader Muslim Brothers (MB) Movement, as stated in that Charter. Similarly, Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) Executive Committee member Ahmad Majdalani suggests that Hamas is attempting to adapt to regional and international changes. However, he notes that some provisions of the document remain ambiguous and open to multiple interpretations. Nevertheless, he argues that the document brings Hamas closer to the PLO’s program regarding the establishment of an independent state within the 1967 borders and the adoption of various forms of struggle. Likewise, PLO Executive Committee member Wasil Abu Yusuf views the document as reflecting Hamas’s recognition of ongoing Arab, regional and international transformations, as well as its acknowledgment of emerging realities. By contrast, Gaza-based Al-Azhar University political science professor Naji Sharab rejects the argument that the document approaches the PLO’s program. He maintains that a significant gap remains between Hamas’s document and the PLO’s political program, which recognizes a Palestinian state within the 1967 borders, recognizes Israel, rejects violence and includes other positions absent from Hamas’s document.
In the same context, British writer David Hearst argues that as if speaking with one voice, Western media outlets interpreted Hamas’s Political Document as a moderation of its position toward Israel and as a challenge to Fatah’s monopoly over the issue of a Palestinian state within the 1967 borders. However, he notes that the document established three conditions preventing Hamas from following Fatah’s path: rejecting recognition of Israel, refusing to relinquish any part of Palestine from the river to the sea, and insisting on the return of all refugees and displaced persons to their homes.
Earlier, Hamas Political Bureau Chief Khalid Mish‘al presented a 19-point working paper at the conference “The Islamists in the Arab World and the Palestine Issue in Light of the Arab Uprisings,” organized by Al-Zaytouna Centre for Studies and Consultations on 28–29/11/2012. The paper outlined Hamas’s intellectual perspective on the Palestine issue, its practical positions and concepts, and the implications of Arab transformations for the Palestine issue, Hamas, and its role. These same points were later reiterated by Mish‘al during his visit to the GS in December 2012 at the movement’s 25th anniversary commemoration. The researcher argues that this paper provided the foundation for Hamas’s subsequent Political Document. At the time, Mish‘al described it as “a reflection of reality rather than theoretical speculation or mere anticipation of the future,” emphasizing that Hamas had been active on the ground for 25 years, striving and experimenting, and that while it might make mistakes, it had more often reached the right conclusions.
The 1988 Charter reflected the broader vision of Islamic movements toward Palestine while incorporating a distinct Palestinian dimension that differentiated Hamas from other Islamic political organizations. Despite not being issued by a formal legislative body—given that Hamas’s internal structures and regulations had not yet been fully established—it remained a key reference point for understanding the movement among both supporters and political opponents. This was also shaped by the conditions of Hamas’s early activity, which relied on secrecy and organized popular mobilization against the occupation. According to Usama al-Ashqar, the Charter’s uncompromising language, broad ideological framing, and some inaccurate slogans became the primary lens through which others viewed Hamas. Consequently, it often appeared at odds with the movement’s official statements and declared policies, including claims regarding its relationship with the global MB Movement and its struggle against Jews.
Debate over the Charter intensified between those calling for its revision and those advocating its replacement. However, Hamas ultimately sought a different approach by developing a new framework that reflected its evolving political identity after decades of experience. In this sense, the Charter came to be viewed as one stage in the movement’s trajectory leading to the issuance of its 2017 Political Document. Nihad al-Sheikh Khalil argues that the secrecy surrounding Hamas’s activities at the time, combined with the focus of its efforts on Palestinian areas under occupation, limited the Charter’s exposure to advanced legal and intellectual expertise. As a result, the Charter adopted an emotional and ideological tone, with language that was largely rhetorical and improvised.
According to Sheikh Khalil, many Hamas cadres recognized at an early stage that the Charter had been drafted hastily. They argued that an Islamic resistance movement aspiring to lead the Palestinian people needed to adopt positions and formulations that better reflected its role and broader significance. Accordingly, discussions emerged within Hamas, both among prisoners and outside Palestine, regarding the possibility of amending the Charter. The most formal of these discussions likely took place in 1993 among the deportees in Marj al-Zuhur; however, none of these efforts resulted in actual amendments for several reasons.
First, Hamas’s leadership was unable to convene in a stable environment during previous periods, which hindered the completion of such discussions within the movement’s leadership institutions.
Second, broad segments of Hamas’s leadership feared that any amendment could be exploited to distort the movement’s positions, particularly given the controversy among Palestinians following the PLO’s amendment of its own Charter.
Third, some within Hamas’s leadership were concerned that any changes could negatively affect the movement’s internal cohesion.
It is important to note that, given Hamas’s circumstances in 1988, particularly its reliance on clandestine activity, the movement’s leadership was unable to submit the Charter to its broader organizational base. Instead, it was issued after approval by the Administrative Office responsible for the West Bank and Gaza Strip, headed by ‘Abd al-Fattah Dukhan. Moreover, it appears that the Political Bureau did not independently formulate the document. Mish‘al explained that the process leading to the 2017 Political Document began four years earlier, when Hamas’s leadership agreed on the need to develop a document reflecting the evolution of the movement’s political thought and practice over three decades, particularly during the preceding ten years… He added that, during the two years before its release, Hamas engaged in extensive internal deliberations, refined the document’s final version, and shaped it through discussions within the movement’s political institutions and leadership, both inside and outside Palestine.
In addition, Hamas’s political leadership benefited from legal consultations drawing on international humanitarian law, the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the 1949 Geneva Conventions affirming peoples’ right to defend their homelands, and relevant UN resolutions on the right of return and the partition plan. The document also highlighted women’s and youth participation, the peaceful transfer of power, and the strategy of gradual liberation. Moreover, Hamas appears to have drawn on the extensive scholarship produced by Palestinian, Arab and foreign writers on the movement throughout its three decades of existence.
Al-Zaytouna Centre for Studies and Consultations, 18/7/2017
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