Militant Group Hamas Absent From Recent Violence

When fighting erupted last week between Palestinians and Israelis, one important component of the area’s explosive political mix was missing: the militant Islamic group Hamas.

Since it claimed responsibility for a wave of suicide bombings earlier this year that left more than 60 people dead, Hamas has suffered a string of debilitating political and military setbacks; hundreds of its leaders and rank and file have been imprisoned by Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat.

But in the poor alleys of Gaza City, where economic frustrations fuel calls for holy war against the Israelis, Hamas activists say their group is poised for a comeback because recent events have vindicated their belief that the peace process is a sham. Hamas says it is biding its time, rebuilding and awaiting its chance to strike new blows for an independent Palestine.

And because militant groups such as Hamas and Islamic Jihad are hovering here, competing with him for public support, Arafat can ill afford to look weak when he meets today at a White House peace summit with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Dr. Mahmoud Zahar, the Hamas spokesman in the teeming slums of the Gaza Strip, where the group is strongest, says he is certain the Washington negotiations ultimately will fail. He made no effort to hide his satisfaction. “This was expected ever since Madrid,” Zahar asserted. “According to our assessment, we believe Israel, from the beginning, was not looking for real peace.”

What Israel wants is to ensure its security without giving up anything of value to the Palestinians, he asserted, adding, “To squeeze our necks, this is not peace.”

Interviewed between patients at his clinic on a decaying, crowded Gaza City street--”We have no room even for the fleas,” he joked--Zahar said Arafat made a mistake when he decided to rein in the Palestinian police after three days of their pitched fighting with the Israelis left more than 70 dead and 1,000 injured.

Instead, Zahar said, Arafat should have whipped up Palestinian resistance even more. “Even the people in the Palestinian Authority shot at the Israelis and demonstrated against Israel,” Zahar said. “That means that they do not believe anymore in the option of negotiating. . . . The people want to teach the Israelis a new lesson.”

Despite its reputation for militancy, Hamas did not appear to lead clashes with Israeli soldiers. Its one statement during the fighting was a plea to Arafat to open his prisons so jailed “lions” could participate. For Arafat to release any detained members of Hamas is exactly what the Israelis don’t want. Because of heightened tensions, Lt. Gen. Amnon Lipkin-Shahak, the Israeli chief of staff, has warned publicly that terrorist attacks may be planned for the coming days in Israel and Lebanon.

“We certainly demand that Hamas prisoners won’t be released, the same way we demand that the Palestinian Authority will make every effort to foil [terrorist] attacks,” Israeli Maj. Gen. Oren Shahor told the newspaper Yediot Aharonot.

Indeed, after the wave of suicide bombings, Israel told Arafat he needed to do more to curb Palestinian bombings of Israeli buses. He responded with a sweep of Hamas suspects, a crackdown many analysts believe effectively defanged the militant group.

Surveys indicate that support for Hamas in the Palestinian community dived after the suicide bus bombings, in part because the attacks led Israeli authorities to seal the West Bank and Gaza Strip, cutting Palestinian workers off from jobs and reducing many families to new depths of poverty.

Hamas’ image also was not helped when Netanyahu was elected Israeli prime minister in May. Hamas was seen as helping him get his office--with disastrous effects for Palestinians--by making Israelis so fearful that they chose a hard-liner.

Ghassan Khatib, a Palestinian political analyst, said that, while Arafat’s police probably won support among Palestinians last week by fighting the Israelis, Hamas was invisible and, thus, cannot capitalize on events.

And despite Israeli fears, Khatib did not see a resumption any time soon by Hamas of a bombing campaign, arguing, “Their goal is to weaken the peace process, and others, such as Netanyahu, are saving them from the effort.”

Muhammed El-Hasan of The Times’ Jerusalem Bureau contributed to this report.