Israel Gave Major Aid to Hamas

United Press International | 24 February 2001 | Richard Sale

[Austin Willard Wright]

United Press International 24 February 2001

Israel gave major to aid to Hamas

By Richard Sale, Terrorism Correspondent

New York -- Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, speaking of the Islamic Resistance Movement Hamas recently described it as "the deadliest terrorist group that we have ever had to face."

Active in Gaza and the West Bank Hamas wants to liberate all of Palestine and establish a radical Islamic state in place of Israel. It has gained notoriety with its assassinations, car bombs and other acts of terrorism.

But Sharon had left something out.

Israel and Hamas may currently be locked in deadly combat, but, according to several current and former U.S. intelligence officials, beginning in the late 1970s, Tel Aviv gave direct and indirect financial aid to Hamas over a period of years.

Israel "aided Hamas directly -- the Israelis wanted to use it as a counterbalance to the PLO," said Tony Cordesman, Middle East analyst for the Center for Strategic Studies.

Israel's support for Hamas "was a direct attempt to divide and dilute support for a strong, secular PLO by using a competing religious alternative," said a former senior CIA official.

According to documents obtained from the Israel-based Institute for Counter Terrorism (ICT) by UPI, Hamas evolved from cells of the Muslim Brotherhood, founded in Egypt in 1928. Islamic movements in Israel and Palestine were "weak and dormant" until after the 1967 Six Day War in which Israel scored a stunning victory over its Arab enemies.

After 1967, a great part of the success of the Hamas/Muslim Brotherhood was due to their activities among the refugees of the Gaza Strip. The cornerstone of the Islamic movements success was an impressive social, religious, educational and cultural infrastructure, called Da'wah, that worked to ease the hardship of large numbers of Palestinian refugees, confined to camps, and many of whom were living on the edge.

"Social influence grew into political influence," first in the Gaza Strip, then on the West Bank, said an administration official who spoke on condition of anonymity.

According to ICT papers, Hamas was legally registered in Israel in 1978 by Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, the movements spiritual leader, as an Islamic Association by the name Al-Mujamma Al Islami, which widened its base of supporters and sympathizers by religious propaganda and social work.

Funds for the movement came from the oil-producing states and directly and indirectly from Israel, according to U.S. intelligence officials. The PLO was secular and leftist and promoted Palestinian nationalism. Hamas wanted set up a transnational state under the rule of Islam, much like Khomeini's Iran.

What took Israeli leaders by surprise was the way the Islamic movements began to surge after the Iranian revolution, after armed resistance to Israel sprang up in southern Lebanon organized by an Iran-backed movement called Hezbollah that bore similitaries to Hamas, these sources said.

"Nothing stirs up the energy for imitation as much as success," commented one administration expert.

A further factor of Hamas' growth was the fact the PLO moved its base of operations to Beirut in the 1980s, leaving the Islamic movements to strengthen their influence in the Occupied Territories "as the court of last resort," he said.

When the intifada began, the Israeli leadership was further surprised when Islamic groups began to surge in membership and strength. Hamas immediately grew in numbers and violence. The group had always embraced the doctrine of armed struggle, but the doctrine had not been practiced and Islamic groups had not been subjected to suppression the way groups like Fatah had been, according to U.S. government officials.

But with the triumph of the Khomeini revolution in Iran, with the birth of Iranian-backed Hezbollah terrorism in Lebanon, Hamas began to gain strength in Gaza and then in the West Bank, relying on terror to resist the Israeli occupation.

Israel was certainly funding the group at that time. One US intelligence source who asked not to be named, said that not only was Hamas being funded as a "counterweight" to the PLO, Israeli aid had a more devious purpose: "to help identify and channel towards Israeli agents Hamas members who were dangerous terrorists."

In addition, by infiltrating Hamas, Israeli informers could listen to debates on policy and identify Hamas members who "were dangerous hardliners," the official said.

In the end, as Hamas set up a very comprehensive counterintelligence system, many collaborators with Israel were weeded out and shot. Violent acts of terrorism became the central tenet, and Hamas, unlike the PLO, was unwilling to compromise in any way with Israel, refusing to acknowledge its very existence.

Even then, some in Israel saw some benefits to be had in trying to continue to give Hamas support: "The thinking on the part of some of the right-wing Israeli establishment was that Hamas and the other groups, if they gained control, would refuse to have anything to do with the pace process and would torpedo any agreements put in place," said a U.S. government official.

"Israel would still be the only democracy in the region for the United States to deal with," he said. All of which is viewed with disapproval by some former U.S. intelligence officials.

"The thing wrong with so many Israeli operations is that they try to be too sexy," said former CIA official Vincent Cannestraro. Former State Department counter-terrorism official Larry Johnson told UPI: "The Israelis are their own worst enemies when it comes to fighting terrorism. They are like a guy who sets fire to his hair and then tries to put it out by hitting it with a hammer.They do more to incite and sustain terrorism than curb it."

Aid to Hamas may have looked clever, "but it was hardly designed to help smooth the waters," he said. "It gives weight to President George W Bush's remark about there being a crisis in education."

Cordesman said that a similar attempt by Egyptian intelligence to fund Egypt's fundamentalists had also come to grief because of overcomplication.

An Israeli Embassy defense official, asked if Israel had given aid to Hamas replied: "I am not able to answer that question. I was in Lebanon commanding a unit at the time, besides it is not my field of interest."

Asked to confirm a report by U.S. officials that Brigadier General Yithaq Segev, the military governor of Gaza, had told U.S. officials that he had helped fund "Islamic movements as a counterweight to the PLO and communists," the Israeli official said he could confirm only that he believed that Segev had served back in 1986.

The Israeli Embassy press office referred UPI to its Web site.

-- Copyright 2001 by United Press International. All rights reserved.

[xvb]

The problem with these threads is that same the same Jewhating whiners show up to try and blame Israel for the terrorism of sick psychos like Hamas.

[Alouette]

I can laugh at the UU's.

You know Larry, you seem to have a problem with the Jooooz that is up close and personal. Is your ex-wife Jewish? Do you hate your mother-in-law? Normal people aren't this preoccupied unless there is a "special someone" who is the focus of all this anger.

So, spill it.

[LarryLied]

Not the "Freud Card" again. Not that. Let's go back to the tying me into websites and writers I've never heard of before. That's more fun.

Or better still, just drop the personal stuff. I don't engage in it not because I'm a naturally polite guy even though I am but because it doesn't convince anyone of anything. If fact, those who do it lose.

[Cachelot]

Let's go back to the tying me into websites and writers I've never heard of before

Since you claim to have invented the term "holocaustism", I'm sure you have never heard of these sites. They seem to have heard of your accomplishment, though :)).

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[SJackson]

Engaging in McCarthyism Cachelot?

Next think you'll try to say the Las Vegas Skinheads, Racial Nationalist’s Library, and the IHR aren't legit sites either.

[eshu]

the story which is to be found on no responsible/reputable outlet, only on nazi/kook outlets

WOW! UPI is a nazi/kook outlet?

That is a sensational charge, sir. Are you sure about that?

BTW, since UPI is owned by the moonies, who also own the Washington Times, I suppose that means that the Washington Times is also a "nazi/kook outlet" too, right?

I am waiting for your proof that this is not so...

[Austin Willard Wright]

FYI

[jwalsh07]

I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and assume the story has some factual basis. Here's my reply:

So what?

[Mo1]

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[Austin Willard Wright]

So what?! You aren't serious are you?!

[jwalsh07]

Serious as a terroist attack that kills Americans Willard. Your analogies and your facts are sadly lacking. The Israelis haven't been killing Americans for the past thirty years, the radical Islamists have. Where the hell have you been?

You got a problem with Israel?

[Austin Willard Wright]

In other words, you admit that *you don't care* whether or not Israel built up Hamas, a major terrorist organization!!! Friggin amazing!

[jwalsh07]

What Israel did thrity years ago has absolutley no bearing on the Iraq debate, none, nada, zippo. If thats all you got Willard, you ain't got nothing.

[Austin Willard Wright]

I never said Israeli support of Hamas had *anything* to do with the current debate over Iraq. That was your conclusion. The key issue which prompted my comment was your, rather rather cold-blooded claim, that you *don't care* whether an ally who has received over 100 billion dollars in U.S. aid since the 1940s, helped to build up a terrorist organization.

[jwalsh07]

You're irrelevant Willard. The debate has passed you by. Adios.

[Austin Willard Wright]

What debate? Every time I challenged you, you changed the subject. You dance almost as well as Ali but I have yet to feel your bee sting. Enjoy your war while you can....but don't say I didn't warn you.

[jwalsh07]

Willard, the thread is here for those who will read it. Remember those names I gave you and the people they killed? You failed to respond because you had nothing to respond with.

Those names were in the speech given by the POTUS tonight and you still have no response. You have nothing Willard but two year old articles full of conjecture about waht the Israeli's may have or may not have done thirty years ago.

Abu Abbas, Abu Nidal, Hamas....Iraq. Remember them Willard, its waht this is all about, terrorists killing Americans with impunity and certain Americans willingness to do absolutely nothing about it.

[Austin Willard Wright]

I did respond (at length). My point was quite simple but I will repeat it. Saddam is an evil character....but the folks you mentioned are no worse than many other evil people in the world. Moreover, the U.S. never even seriously called for their extradition (nor is it doing it now!) The current hype about them is only a pretext. This is primarily a social engineering war to create a "new Iraq" through nation-building and create a pro-U.S. counterweight to Saudi Arabia.

In my view, wars waged by U.S. should be for defense only (hence the Afghanistan war was just and proper) not for the naive Wilsonian purpose of stamping out evil. Wilsonian wars, to establish democracy, build nations, kill bad people, police, etc., only waste resources and detract the American military from its essential role as the defender of the U.S.

As I said before, you will get your Wilsonian war. It will be fun for a while and I suspect that the initial occupation will be fairly easy. A year or two from you now, however, your fairy tale dream of creating a stable and democratic Iraq will be in tatters. It will be replaced by a bottomless foreign aid rathole and yet another dangerous and futile "police" occupation by U.S. troops....by then, of course, the Demopublicans will probably be planning an intervention somewhere else to repeat the cycle all over again.