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Secretaris-Generaal VN
Geregistreerd: 24 maart 2014
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Citaat:
Oorspronkelijk geplaatst door Tamam
En wat het excuus om in de westbank oorlogsmisdaden te begaan? Zondebok Hamas is daar niet.
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Het zijn zulke hypocriete en leugenachtige beweringen die je hele betoog ongeloofwaardig maken...
Dat Hamas de absolute macht niet heeft in westbank is een feit. Dat ze er al jaren en dagen een eigen structuur hebben is dat ook. Het is zelfs zo dat Fatah en hun veiligheidsdienst in een continue strijd zitten en dat zij regelmatig Hamas aanhangers arresteren en liquideren.
De leiding van Hamas is als een Hydra, als je een hoofd afhakt groeit er een nieuw in de plaats. Maar ga alsjeblief niet meesmuilen dat Hamas niet aanwezig is in westbank, tenzij je denkt dat hier enkel ongeletterden actief zijn.
Citaat:
‘There is never a vacuum’: How Hamas keeps functioning even as Israel kills its leaders
The terror group has adapted amid targeted assassinations and a prolonged war, enabling it to keep making strategic decisions; crucially, no viable alternative has emerged
In April, the IDF eliminated the same Hamas official three times.
That month, Israeli troops announced that they had killed the terror group’s battalion commander in the Shejaiya neighborhood of Gaza City. A new Hamas operative replaced that fallen officer, only for the military to then assassinate him. When a third fighter took the position, Israel killed that man as well before the end of the month.
In total, since October 7, 2023, seven Hamas operatives have held the title of Shejaiya battalion commander. Six have been eliminated. The latest gunman leading the unit is presumably living on borrowed time, with Israel ramping up its offensive in the city.
The repeated operations in Shejaiya, historically a fierce urban battlefield for Israeli troops, exemplify how, over the past almost two years of fighting in Gaza, the IDF has repeatedly taken out Hamas functionaries — key leaders and numerous brigade and battalion commanders within the group’s military wing — only to see new ones take their place.
The steady drumbeat of high-profile killings, a core element of Israel’s declared war goal of destroying Hamas and ensuring it cannot revive, has put unprecedented strain on the terror group. In addition to lower-level officers, Israel has eliminated Hamas political bureau chief Ismail Haniyeh; Yahya Sinwar, Hamas’s political head in Gaza and the architect of the October 7 massacre; Sinwar’s brother and replacement, Mohammed Sinwar; Mohammed Deif, the head of Hamas’s military wing; and, this week, spokesman Abu Obeida.
But the aftermath of those strikes also demonstrates how Hamas’s basic structure has enabled it to continue replenishing its ranks and making strategic decisions despite the heavy losses. Ideologically committed to the declared strategic aim of destroying Israel, dispersed across several countries, and with many of its top officials located far from the fighting, the terror group has managed to continue functioning even as it buries its leaders.
by Israel, are seen in a propaganda video released by Hamas on August 30, 2025. (Screenshot: X, used in accordance with Clause 27a of the Copyright Law)
In April, the IDF eliminated the same Hamas official three times.
That month, Israeli troops announced that they had killed the terror group’s battalion commander in the Shejaiya neighborhood of Gaza City. A new Hamas operative replaced that fallen officer, only for the military to then assassinate him. When a third fighter took the position, Israel killed that man as well before the end of the month.
In total, since October 7, 2023, seven Hamas operatives have held the title of Shejaiya battalion commander. Six have been eliminated. The latest gunman leading the unit is presumably living on borrowed time, with Israel ramping up its offensive in the city.
The repeated operations in Shejaiya, historically a fierce urban battlefield for Israeli troops, exemplify how, over the past almost two years of fighting in Gaza, the IDF has repeatedly taken out Hamas functionaries — key leaders and numerous brigade and battalion commanders within the group’s military wing — only to see new ones take their place.
The steady drumbeat of high-profile killings, a core element of Israel’s declared war goal of destroying Hamas and ensuring it cannot revive, has put unprecedented strain on the terror group. In addition to lower-level officers, Israel has eliminated Hamas political bureau chief Ismail Haniyeh; Yahya Sinwar, Hamas’s political head in Gaza and the architect of the October 7 massacre; Sinwar’s brother and replacement, Mohammed Sinwar; Mohammed Deif, the head of Hamas’s military wing; and, this week, spokesman Abu Obeida.
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But the aftermath of those strikes also demonstrates how Hamas’s basic structure has enabled it to continue replenishing its ranks and making strategic decisions despite the heavy losses. Ideologically committed to the declared strategic aim of destroying Israel, dispersed across several countries, and with many of its top officials located far from the fighting, the terror group has managed to continue functioning even as it buries its leaders.
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“There is never a vacuum,” said Michael Milstein, head of the Forum for Palestinian Studies at Tel Aviv University’s Dayan Center. “Even at the level of battalion and company commanders in Hamas’s military wing… there’s always someone motivated to step in, despite knowing that their death is almost certain. It’s quite remarkable.”
A remote and compartmentalized leadership
One explanation for Hamas’s organizational stamina is that since 1990, a few years after its founding in 1987, the group’s leadership has been divided officially between a military wing focused on operations and a political wing responsible for long-term strategy.
Within the military wing, based in Gaza, promotions and structure resemble those of a conventional army led by commanding officers, or at least they did until the IDF set about dismantling Hamas’s 24 battalions after October 7.
By contrast, the political wing is based in Qatar and operates a bit more democratically: It holds organized internal elections every four years, with each leadership tier electing the one directly above it, from junior members up to the political bureau at the top. The last elections took place in 2021; none have been held during the war. Elections are also geographically segmented: Hamas members abroad, in Gaza, in the West Bank, and in Israeli prisons all vote for their own local leadership.
In practice, the lines between these two halves of the organization can blur: Yahya Sinwar, for example, was a political officer in Gaza before October 7, but orchestrated the terror group’s deadly attack that day. And Deif, the military chief, was one of the key figures influencing negotiations before he was killed last year.
Still, the bifurcation means that two years into Israel’s war in Gaza, Hamas’s most significant centers of decision-making lie thousands of kilometers away, in Qatar and Turkey. It is these groups of leaders who direct Hamas’s strategic decisions — above all, negotiations for a ceasefire. The process today is more complex than in the past, as no single figure is at the top, and about eight leaders must reach decisions together from two different countries.
Even so, Hamas has proven able to operate — for example, issuing a formal statement in August accepting the latest ceasefire proposal.
“In general, Hamas is a network-based organization, one with multiple centers of power,” explained Harel Horev, another researcher at the Dayan Center. “This was the case even before October 7, and even before Yahya Sinwar.”
He added, “Once the war began, Israel started striking all the surrounding centers of power, and that demonstrates Hamas’s resilience. A hierarchical structure is very vulnerable – you kill the head, and it collapses. But when you hit a network, there are always people ready to take their place.”
‘No splits, no expulsions’
Hamas’s remote leadership hasn’t escaped Israeli fire. Until his July 2024 assassination in Iran, Ismail Haniyeh, officially head of Hamas’s political bureau in Gaza, was based in Doha, far outside the Strip. He was briefly succeeded by Yahya Sinwar, who remained inside Gaza until his killing in October 2024.
After Sinwar’s death, Hamas officials told media outlets that a five-member council outside Gaza would collectively run the movement. Milstein cites the slightly larger number of eight senior officials who now jointly manage the organization from abroad.
The most prominent of these figures, and the one who has spoken publicly on behalf of Hamas since Haniyeh’s assassination, is Khalil al-Hayya. Once Sinwar’s deputy, al-Hayya has in recent months been described by Hamas’s own media as the movement’s leader in Gaza — despite the fact that he too lives in Qatar, and that no internal elections have been held since the war began.
Another key decision-maker abroad is Nizar Awadallah, an early Hamas activist from the late 1980s who nearly defeated Sinwar in the 2021 political bureau leadership vote. Also central is Mohammed Darwish, head of Hamas’s Shura Council, the body formally tasked with advising the movement’s political leadership.
Beyond Qatar, Turkey has also become a critical base for Hamas. There, Zaher Jabarin serves as Hamas’s leader for the West Bank after his predecessor, Saleh al-Arouri, who was also based in Turkey, was assassinated in January 2024. Like other wartime appointments, his is remote, and was made without elections. Being in Turkey allows Jabarin to avoid arrest or assassination, which would be likely were he operating on the ground in the West Bank.
“Twenty-two months after October 7, there are no splits within the movement, and no figures have been expelled from Hamas,” Milstein said. “The organization remains largely united, which demonstrates that its internal dynamics are still functioning.”
Milstein points to two principles that underpin Hamas’s continued ability to make decisions despite its leadership losses: shura (consultation) and ijma (consensus). Both are rooted in Islamic tradition and associated with the governance style of the Prophet Muhammad. They mean that decisions must be reached through consultation and by majority agreement, not imposed by a single individual.
This system has allowed Hamas to continue decision-making even without a single leader at its head today, and even as some officials have been hiding for months in Gaza’s underground tunnel network. While their influence may be diminished, Hamas operatives inside Gaza still take part in shaping the group’s choices via consultation.
“Everything, including the wording of the ceasefire agreement that Hamas recently announced it had accepted, is the product of consultation,” Milstein explained. “It’s not as if Khalil al-Hayya simply woke up one morning and said, ‘Let’s move this forward. I don’t care what [Gaza-based leader] Izz al-Din Haddad thinks.'”
One set of Hamas officials who have been unable to evade Israeli dismantlement, however, are those who previously comprised Hamas’s prison hierarchy. Before October 7, the group’s prison leadership represented Palestinian detainees — including Hamas — in dealings with the Israel Prison Service. Elected in secret during the group’s four-year cycles, these figures were not named publicly, but were well known behind bars and to Israel’s security services.
Since the war began, however, Israeli authorities have broken up that leadership structure. The last Hamas prison leader, Salameh Qatawi, elected in 2021, was released to the West Bank during the most recent ceasefire, in February 2025. According to Milstein, Hamas’s prison leadership has ceased to function.
Hamas’s command inside Gaza
Hamas’s leaders within Gaza, of course, are easier for Israel to eliminate than those in faraway countries. After the assassinations of the Sinwars and Deif — all of whom led Hamas from inside the Strip — only a handful of senior figures remain in Gaza today.
The two most prominent are Haddad, who, before the war, commanded Hamas’s Gaza City Brigade, and Raed Saad, described in Arabic media during the war as the head of Hamas’s military production apparatus.
According to Israeli security officials, Haddad was appointed commander of Hamas’s military wing following Deif’s death. However, Milstein argues that his role is narrower than that of his predecessor, due to his limited experience, and that his focus is confined mainly to Hamas’s military activity inside Gaza and enforcing law and order.
Horev also said Haddad represents a step down from Deif for the terror group.
“After Israel killed Mohammed Sinwar, it brought Hamas to the bottom of the barrel,” he said. “Izz al-Din Haddad didn’t immediately take control. It took him several weeks to get a grip on Hamas’s military wing. He and Raed Saad are the last of the Mohicans in Hamas in Gaza today.”
He added that killing Haddad could degrade Hamas’s power in the Strip even further.
“The moment you take out Izz al-Din Haddad, you’re talking about a network that will operate at a much lower profile,” Horev said. “If a junior figure ends up running the military wing inside Gaza, it’s likely he won’t be listened to, neither from within the Strip nor from abroad.”
In his new role, Haddad may be overseeing a shift in the way Hamas governs the parts of the enclave it still controls, adopting more secretive methods and cracking down on local opposition as the fighting goes on.
Throughout the war, including in recent weeks, videos from Gaza have shown men in civilian clothes — identified or self-identifying as Hamas operatives — shooting individuals accused of stealing humanitarian aid. On August 23, Hamas also claimed it had executed four alleged collaborators with Israel.
‘Just pushing Hamas into other places’
Hamas has controlled Gaza since it ousted the Palestinian Authority from the enclave in a deadly, brief civil war in 2007, and in the nearly two decades since, the group’s military wing has remained focused on fighting Israel.
Civilian affairs in the Strip, meanwhile, were run via government ministries Hamas inherited from the PA — education, health, economy, and others — alongside security bodies such as the police that were tasked with maintaining internal order. Those systems were overseen by a shadow government composed of senior Hamas officials, which the terror group only occasionally acknowledged publicly.
Since the start of the war, Israel has taken over much of Gaza’s territory and destroyed swaths of its infrastructure. Gaza’s schools and government ministries are now mostly closed. Some hospitals continue to operate, as do Hamas’s internal security mechanisms and its health ministry, which serves as the source for casualty numbers in the Strip.
Israel has also targeted leaders of Hamas’s civilian government. It announced several times since October 2023 that it had killed men it claimed were acting as Hamas’s prime minister in Gaza — including Ismail Daalis and Ismail Barhoum, the latter killed in March 2025. It is unclear who, if anyone, currently fills that role.
At the same time, a number of lower-level functionaries remain in place within various ministries. One such known figure is Munir al-Bursh, Hamas’s director-general of the health ministry, who has served in his role for at least five years.
Several of these officials have been killed by Israel during the war, and new appointees are likely still operating under Hamas’s authority. For example, the current mayor of Deir al-Balah, Nizar Ayash, was appointed without elections, unlike previous mayors. His predecessor, Diab al-Jaru, was killed by Israel in December 2024. The IDF said he had maintained close ties with Hamas operatives and aided them in the city.
Crucially, Milstein said no viable alternative to the terror group has emerged in the areas where most of the population still lives. The Abu Shabab militia, backed by Israel, operates only in depopulated zones in eastern Rafah in Gaza’s south, not in densely populated areas.
“Nothing magical is sprouting up in its place. People don’t want to trade the horror of Hamas for something unknown. They fear chaos, and they’re exhausted,” Milstein said.
He assessed that even if Israel follows through on its plan to capture Gaza City, it still won’t mean the end of Hamas as a functioning organization.
“If the conquest of Gaza is accompanied by the evacuation of the population, then it’s more of the same. Clearly, the international damage to Israel would be massive, but even from a purely military perspective, it means you’re just pushing Hamas into other places,” he said.
“We’re trying to have it both ways: Either you conquer the entire Strip, control it, and remain there for the long term, or you’re just bluffing,” he continued. “And right now, we’re just bluffing.”
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bron : https://www.timesofisrael.com/there-...s-its-leaders/
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Citaat:
Oorspronkelijk geplaatst door Knuppel
...De Wever is een klootzak, en dit op meerdere vlakken. O.a. wat betreft zijn Blokhaat en zijn walgelijke kontenkruiperij in het stronthol van de partijen die hem een mes in de rug staken...
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Laatst gewijzigd door Pandareus : Gisteren om 17:10.
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Gisteren, 09:27
