Hamas Debates the Future – Attempting to Reconcile Ideological Purity and Political Realism
Download a full version of this publication as a PDF here.
Palestine’s Islamic Resistance Movement — Hamas — won a surprising electoral victory in the January 2006 Palestinian parliamentary elections. Almost immediately, Hamas leaders, movement activists, and Islamist academics began to debate the future course of the movement. Under what conditions would Hamas recognize Israel? What was its place as a movement in the Middle East? How should it approach the question of governance of the Palestinian territories? And finally, and most importantly, how would it balance its need to remain an Islamist party while adopting more pragmatic political programs?
The monograph’s author, Khalid Amayreh, is an American-educated freelance Palestinian journalist based in the West Bank. He writes regularly for the Cairo-based Al-Ahram Weekly and the Palestine Information Center. His articles also appear regularly on several news sites on the internet.