“Hamas terrorists bound, burned, and executed children,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu proclaimed in a speech Monday, condemning the perpetrators of Saturday’s terror.
“They are savages. Hamas is ISIS.”
The comparison to the notorious terrorist organization ISIS underscored the gravity of the situation and the global threat that Netanyahu believes Hamas poses. Just as the international community rallied together to combat the menace of ISIS, the prime minister implored the forces of civilization to unite once more, supporting Israel’s efforts to dismantle Hamas.
But is Hamas ISIS?
Dr. Harel Chorev of the Moshe Dayan Center for Middle Eastern Studies at Tel Aviv University said that Hamas and ISIS share ideological foundations and revere the same philosophical figures that developed them: Abdullah Azzam and Sayyid Qutb.
Azzam, born in the Palestinian West Bank during the 1950s under Jordanian rule, is often regarded as pivotal in developing contemporary global jihadism. A deep-seated hatred towards Israel marked his early years, particularly intensified when his family was compelled to flee across the Jordan River following Israel’s victory in the 1967 Six-Day War.
Azzam’s writings and lectures on “al-Qaida al-Sulba” (the Firm Foundation) laid the groundwork for the emergence of the al-Qaida terrorist organization. He recruited Osama Bin Laden to run the organization.
Additionally, Azzam was a central figure in Hamas’s genesis, contributing to its founding charter’s authorship. He is best known for his reinterpretation of Islamic history and modern Western philosophy to provide ideological justifications for the fantastical ideologies driving global Islamist militant movements.
Sayyid Qutb was an Egyptian ideologue who established the theoretical basis for radical Islamism.
Centered on these philosophers’ ideologies, Hamas and ISIS subscribe to a profoundly paranoid and apocalyptic perspective, in which they propagate the belief that “Crusaders and Zionists” were conspiring for centuries to destroy Islam.
“They are running a holy war against their enemies,” explained Chorev.
However, the similarities between ISIS and Hamas are not only in philosophy but action, Chorev said. Here are four more things they have in common:
Dehumanization of non-Muslims
As per Chorev’s analysis, both ISIS and Hamas employ dehumanizing rhetoric against individuals who do not adhere to their interpretation of Islam – Christians and Jews, as well as Muslims they consider “not good Muslims.” Their vehemently anti-Western stance is interconnected with this dehumanization, as is their explicit and overt expression of antisemitism.
“You can see it in their incitement on social networking,” Chorev said, illustrating his point by referencing an incident following the tragic murder of Alter Shlomo Lederman, a 20-year-old yeshiva student who was deliberately targeted at a Ramot bus stop earlier this year. He noted that Hamas had released a cartoon depicting Lederman’s face, complete with his fur hat, portrayed as part of a Palestinian maqluba dish, with a family gathered around, consuming it.
“They see their enemies not as human enemies,” Chorev said.
Treatment of women
Both ISIS and Hamas are known to treat non-Muslim women as “sex toys,” said Chorev.
Following the recent attacks, videos circulated of the terrorists glorifying Allah for sending them “sex slaves.” Israeli actress and advocate Noa Tishby shared footage released online by Hamas in which you can see several girls paraded through Gaza’s city streets, some half-naked and others with blood gushing from between their legs.
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Similar stories have been shared by Yazidi women and girls who were abducted by ISIS and often sold into sexual slavery.
Martyrdom
Both ISIS and Hamas celebrate becoming a “shaheed” or martyr for the Islamic faith. According to Chorev, when terrorists are apprehended in Israel there are often accounts of them expressing a willingness to die or even a desire for it, sometimes sharing that, “My family would be proud of me.”
He said, “This is hard, even impossible, for a typical Westerner to understand. How could someone desire his death? But it is the great common denominator between ISIS and Hamas.”
According to Chorev, the two organizations have at least one more thing in common:
By December 2017, the ISIS caliphate had relinquished control over 95% of its territory. Then, in 2019, the final vestiges of the physical ISIS caliphate met their end when the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces declared triumph following the Battle of Baghuz Fawqani in March 2019, effectively pushing the group into dormancy.
“ISIS was the boss for quite some time until the West decided to destroy it,” Chorev concluded. “Hamas can be destroyed, too.”