On November 23, 2002, a Hamas bulletin proclaimed that Allah required good Muslims to comply with the words of its spiritual leader Sheik Ahmed Yassin: "We will knock on the doors of heaven with the skulls of the Jews." In the video released after her attack on January 13, 2004, Hamas suicide bomber Reem al-Reyashi, 22, said: ''It was always my wish to turn my body into deadly shrapnel against the Zionists and to knock on the doors of heaven with the skulls of the Zionists.'' Reyashi left behind a son aged 3, and a year-old daughter. She also murdered four Israelis who had come to assist her when she feigned sickness. The message was, is and remains a jihad (holy war) against Israel and Islamic fundamentalism is at the core.

In the wake of the tragedy, the Palestinian Authority's Prime Minister Ahmed Qurei refused to condemn the attack and Ha'aretz editorialized: "Nothing has done more to tarnish the image of the Palestinian national movement than suicide bombings. Nothing has done more to align Palestinians in the foreign (especially the American) mind with the likes of al-Qaeda. Nothing has done more to alienate Israelis from the Palestinian cause. Nothing has done more to fortify the argument that...their true goal is the eradication of the entirety of the Jewish state and the annihilation or exile of its non-Arab inhabitants."

In a well-researched article in the January 7th newsletter of the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, Jonathan Halevi concludes that there is growing evidence that Fatah, the Palestinian faction that today dominates the PLO, may not remain the power center in the post-Arafat era. The power in the Palestinian Authority, he concludes, will pass to Hamas.

Bir Zeit, the oldest Palestinian college, offers insight into the organization's ascendancy. In elections last month, a Hamas-led alliance, the Islamic Bloc, won nearly half the seats on Bir Zeit's student council -- a shock for a school long considered a Fatah stronghold. Middle-class professionals also are turning to Hamas in growing numbers. In recent weeks, Hamas has notched big gains in elections for influential associations of engineers and doctors that were once the preserve of Fatah activists. Hamas has already established its own "army" in the Gaza Strip in opposition to the Palestinian Authority, and assumes that it will succeed that of the Palestinian Authority. Halevi concludes: "Any scenarios for the future that do not take into account the possibility of a Hamas takeover of the Palestinian political system are seriously deficient."

This means that Hamas (which maintains strong ideological links to al Qaeda) may ultimately control the reins of power. "Muslim Palestine" (which today is nothing more than a Hamas magazine) would become the raison d'etre of a new terrorist state in the Middle East. According to Sheik Ahmed Yassin, the spiritual leader of Hamas: "Good Muslims will kill anyone who accepts peace with the Jews or who speaks of an independent Palestine (only on the West Bank and Gaza). The only acceptable outcome for Hamas is a united realm of Islam in Palestine." There is no doubt that the "culture of death" that Hamas has fostered would be increased exponentially should Hamas seize power in a post-Arafat coup.

From the American perspective, a Hamas-controlled Palestinian Authority would mean a major Islamic victory, a new al Qaeda proxy in the heart of the Middle East. The current U.S. administration recognizes that both Israel and the United States are engaged in a common war against an Islamic fundamentalist enemy characterized by a hatred for all things Western. Whether or not the United States would then give Israel a green light to unleash its full military power against this threat to both U.S. and Israeli interests remains to be seen. What is certain is that it would be foolish for America to hold Israel back as there are no ideological firewalls separating Hamas, Islamic Jihad, the Moslem Brotherhood and al Qaeda. They are all Islamic terror franchises and they mean to expel all Western influence from the Middle East.

The Hamas chat-room participants discussed how best to kill the "American dogs," covering such options as running them over, throwing a Molotov cocktail at their car, burning them in their cabin on the beach, poisoning them, or shooting them "as an example for others like them."

Hamas has already declared that America is a target. On December 17, 2001, Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad released a joint manifesto declaring that "Americans are the enemies of the Palestinian people [and] a target for future attacks." The following day, Hamas leaders issued a statement declaring that "Americans [are] now considered legitimate targets as well as Israelis." In June 2002 ,an official Hamas web site featured a chat-room discussion on the prospect of murdering a group of fifteen American citizens. The chat-room participants discussed how best to kill the "American dogs," covering such options as running them over, throwing a Molotov cocktail at their car, burning them in their cabin on the beach, poisoning them, or shooting them "as an example for others like them." Such murders would

February 2004               - 3 -               Outpost