The Muslim Brotherhood (Hamas) Now Faces Difficult Decisions
By Douglas Farah
One of the most interesting things about the current Hamas move to consolidate its power in the Palestinian territories is the question of how that move will play with Salafi/wahhabist groups in their love-hate relationship with Hamas.
It is necessary to remember two things: Hamas remains directly tied to the Muslim Brotherhood, both organically and officially, as described in the Hamas charter. The second is that Hamas and the Salafist groups have been in a deep and bitter dispute because of Hamas' decision to participate in the elections last year. There have been other spats before, but this was a different level of denunciation and recrimination.
Ayman Zawahiri was particularly vocal in publicly denouncing Hamas at the time in the strongest possible terms. On the various jihadi and Hamas web forums that routinely cross-linked to each other the feud grew so bitter that such cross-pollination has dropped off considerably. Hamas has thrown jihadi commentators off Hamas sites, and the jihadis have reciprocated. (Evan Kohlmann is the authority on this).
So an important question, to me, is, what now? The elections are now a moot point and the unity government now a thing of the past. The Muslim Brotherhood's sole, overt armed branch has participated in and won elections, but has proved unable to co-exist in a coalition with secular partners.
Hamas has asserted itself militarily and shown a willingness to fight not only against Israel, but against other Palestinian groups that do not share its vision of the future. My entire blog is here.
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