Hamas Charter August 18, 1988
(Given the length of the texts, I’ve taken the liberty of giving the most explicit extracts, those that I personally felt were important for understanding the political, Islamic and spiritual issues at stake in the Middle East).
1 Muharram 1409 Hijri August 18, 1988
In the name of Allah, Clement and Merciful You are the best of the peoples of mankind; you command what is good and forbid what is evil, and you believe in Allah. And if the People of the Book (Jews and Christians) had had this faith, it would have been better for them. Some are believers, but most are perverted. They can only cause you insignificant damage. If they decide to wage war against you, they will soon turn their backs and will not be helped. Ignominy will be their lot if they do not seek an alliance with Allah and mankind. And they will incur the wrath of God, and misery will spread like a tent over their heads. Such will be their suffering because they refused to believe in the signs of Allah and unjustly murdered the prophets; this will be the price of their rebellion and their iniquities. (Koran, III, 106-108).
Israel will exist and continue to exist until Islam annihilates it (Imam Hassan al Banna).
Ideological basis
ARTICLE ONE. The Islamic Resistance Movement draws its guiding principles from Islam. From Islam it draws its ideas, its way of thinking and its understanding of the universe: life, man. It is used in its judgments and conduct, and as a guide for all its actions.
ARTICLE TWO. The Islamic Resistance Movement is one of the wings of the Muslim Brotherhood in Palestine. The Muslim Brotherhood organization is a universal movement that forms the largest Islamic movement of our time. It is characterized by a deep understanding, exact scope and complete adoption of all the concepts of Islam in life: culture, belief, politics, economics, education, society, justice, judgment, education, art, information, conversion to Islam and the spread of Islam.
ARTICLE SIX. The Islamic Resistance Movement is an honorable Palestinian movement which pledges allegiance both to Allah and to his way, Islam. It strives to raise the banner of Islam over every inch of Palestine, for under the wing of Islam, believers of all religions can coexist in safety for their lives, property and rights. In the absence of Islam, conflict will rage, oppression will spread, evil will persist, schism and war will break out. The Muslim poet Mohamed Ikbal put it admirably: If faith is lost, security disappears and there is no life for him who does not adhere to religion; He who accepts life without religion has taken annihilation as his companion.
ARTICLE SEVEN. The fact that all these Muslims, all over the world, adhere to the principles of the Islamic Resistance Movement, support it and its principles and positions as well as its struggle, proves that the Hamas movement is universal. And it is well equipped to do so, thanks to the clarity of its ideology and the nobility of its aims and objectives. It is on this basis that the Movement must be judged and assessed, and its role recognized. Those who deny it this right, avoid supporting it, turn a blind eye to the facts, whether intentionally or not, must wake up. They will see that events have overtaken them and that no logic justifies their attitude. We must learn from the examples of the past. The injustice of a close relative is harder to bear than the strike of the Indian sword.
The Islamic Resistance Movement is one of the links in the chain of struggle against the Zionist invaders. It goes back to 1939, and the emergence of the martyr Ezzedine al-Qasem and his brothers, the fighting members of the Muslim Brotherhood. It lengthens to unite with another chain, which is the struggle of the Palestinians and the Muslim Brotherhood during the 1948 war, then the jihad operations of the Muslim Brotherhood in 1968 and later.
ARTICLE EIGHT. Allah is his goal, the prophet his model, jihad his path and death for the cause of Allah his highest wish.
ARTICLE ELEVEN. The Islamic Resistance Movement believes that Palestine is an Islamic Waqf (charitable donation) dedicated to generations of Muslims until Judgement Day. Not a single parcel of it can be squandered or abandoned to others. No Arab country, Arab president or Arab king, nor all Arab kings and presidents combined, nor any organization, even Palestinian, has the right to do so. Palestine is a Muslim Waqf dedicated to generations of Muslims until Judgment Day.
ARTICLE THIRTEEN. Initiatives and so-called peace solutions and international conferences contradict the principles of the Islamic Resistance. Violating any part of Palestine is a violation of religion. The nationalism of the Islamic Resistance Movement is part of the religion. Its members have been nourished by it. To raise the banner of Allah in their motherland, they fight. “Allah will be the victor, but most people don’t know it”.
There is no solution to the Palestinian question except jihad. International initiatives, proposals and conferences are a waste of time and futile attempts. The Palestinian people refuse to accept that their future, their rights and their destiny should be the object of speculation.
ARTICLE FIFTEEN. The day the enemies usurp a land of Islam, jihad becomes the individual duty of every Muslim. Faced with the Jewish usurpation of the land of Palestine, the banner of jihad must be raised.
To achieve this, it is necessary to propagate Islamic consciousness among the local Muslim masses, Arabs, and on the Muslim plane. It is necessary to instill the spirit of jihad in the hearts of the nation so that the people confront the enemy and join the ranks of the fighters. It is necessary for scholars, educators, teachers, the media and journalists, as well as the educated masses, especially young people and the movement’s imams, to take part in the awakening operation. It is important that school curricula be changed at grassroots level to purify them of the traces of ideological invasions.
ARTICLE EIGHTEEN. The woman in a fighting family, whether mother or sister, plays the most important role in looking after the family, bringing up the children, instilling in them the moral values and thoughts of Islam. She must teach them to fulfill their religious duty, to prepare them for the role of fighter that awaits them. That’s why the utmost attention must be paid to schools and curricula, to educating Muslim girls, so that when they become mothers, they play their part in the battle for liberation.
ARTICLE TWENTY-EIGHT. The Zionist invasion is vicious. It does not shrink from any means and method, using all vicious and despicable means to achieve its goal. The Arab countries surrounding Israel must open their borders to fighters from Arab and Islamic countries, to enable them to consolidate their efforts and join their Arab Muslim brothers in Palestine. As for the other Arab and Muslim countries, they must facilitate the movement of fighters.
ARTICLE THIRTY-ONE. The Islamic Resistance Movement is a humanist movement. It is concerned with human rights. It is guided by Islamic tolerance when dealing with the followers of other religions. It opposes them only when they are hostile. Under the banner of Islam, the followers of three religions – Islam, Christianity and Judaism – can coexist peacefully. But this peace is only possible under the banner of Islam. Past and present bear witness to this.
ARTICLE THIRTY-TWO. World Zionism and the imperialist powers are attempting, through well-established plans and clever strategy, to eliminate one Arab state after another from the circle of the struggle against Zionism, so that in the end only the Palestinians are left to fight. Egypt was eliminated through the treacherous Camp David accords. They are trying to lure other Arab countries in the same way. The Islamic Resistance Movement calls on Arab and Islamic nations to adopt a serious policy and persevere in their action to prevent the implementation of the horrible plan to remove them from the circle of struggle against Zionism. Today it’s Palestine, tomorrow it could be another Arab country. The Zionist plan has no limits. After Palestine, the Zionists want to monopolize the land from the Nile to the Euphrates. Once they have digested the conquered region, they will aspire to further conquests.
The Islamic Resistance Movement sees itself as spearheading the circle of struggle against global Zionism. The Movement joins forces with all fighters in the Palestinian arena. Arab and Islamic countries must increase their share; all the world’s Islamic groups should do likewise, as they are better equipped to fight the warmongering Jews.
ARTICLE THIRTY-THREE. The Islamic Resistance Movement acts according to general concepts that are coherent and consistent with the universal rules that flow in the river of destiny. Thus, it fights against the enemy and defends Muslims and Islamic civilization as well as sacred sites, including the al-Aqsa Mosque.278