The Political Bureau
The Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas)
16 April 1994

Important Statement by the Political Bureau

Since assuming office, the terrorist Yitzhak Rabin has continued his repressive measures against all segments of Palestinian society.  His orders flow apace to occupation troops to shoot Palestinians without discriminating between a civilian bystander and an armed person or between young and old.  He also has given a free hand to hordes of armed settlers to terrorize our people, to murder them, and to desecrate their sacred values and places.  Indeed, premeditated acts of murder continue apace at the hands of troops as well as settlers, victimizing women, children, and old men.

Further, despite Rabin's claims of pursuing peace, with the launching of the Madrid-Washington process and the signing of the Oslo Agreement, the crimes of the government of the terrorist Rabin against our people have multiplied, as have stringent security measures including collective punishment and military closure of all areas of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.

In response to this murderous policy, our people have intensified their resistance to occupation and attacked its instruments and symbols represented by troops and settlers.  This is precisely the strategy adopted by the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas).

Rabin's government outdid itself in its repressive measures, which reached a crescendo when Rabin's troops conspired with settlers in the criminal massacre of Hebron (Al-Khalil) that targeted worshippers at the Mosque of Abraham as they knelt down for the dawn prayers.  Likewise, the troops fire at pregnant Palestinian woemen while in their homes or balconies.  These excesses have compelled all of our people to rise up and intensify their resistance to occupation and to seek vengeance for the martyrs of the Hebron massacre.

In loyalty to the blood of martyrs, the 'Izzidin al-Qassam Brigades, which operate throughout the homeland vowed to avenge the blood of martyrs.  Accordingly, two of our heroic warriors carried out two suicide missions at Afula and Hadera, targeting centers of troop and settler concentrations, despite Rabin's heightened security measures that were especially strict during their celebration of the anniversary of the usurpation of our country.

Rabin's measures failed to stop our heroic operations, carried out amidst his efforts to implement the Oslo Agreement with all the shameful concessions on the part of the PLO leadership that it entails, and failed to fulfil the longing of the Zionist masses for peace and security.  In the face of sharpening Likud opposition to the agreement, this devastating failure caused Rabin to feel deep frustration and frightful floundering.
In commenting on this subject, Hamas wishes to emphasize the following.
First: The prime minister of the enemy, the terrorist Yitzhak Rabin, claiming that Jordan hosts some Hamas leaders, issued a threat to brotherly Jordan, demanding that it take measures against the activities of Hamas.  This is a mere pretext, for the Movement's representative in Amman did no more than to confirm the announcement of the Qassam Brigades that they had carried out the heroic operations in Afula and Hadera.  Truly, Rabin and the members of his criminal government know with certainty that the Qassam Brigades planned, executed, and announced the operation entirely from within our occupied lands.

But because of his inability to put a stop to these operations and his all too evident deceits in the settlement process, he exploits these events to threaten Jordan, apparently for the following purposes:
To shift attention from the true nature and the failure of his strict and repressive security measures to end either the heroic suicide missions by the Qassam Brigades or other popular resistance operations carried out by our people in all parts of our holy land.
To use the American sword to pressure Jordan to sign a separate agreement with his government on the model of Oslo.  This threat is consistent with the American administration's policy that employs the inspection of commercial ships in the Gulf of Aqaba as an instrument to achieve the same purpose.

Similarly, the American administration keeps Syria on its list of countries that support terrorism, or those that fail to fight the spread of drugs, as an instrument to pressure Syria to drop its demand for a comprehensive solution on all fronts.

We, in Hamas, are perfectly aware of the true position of the enemy toward peace - which is to get the Arab parties to submit to its humiliating conditions, even as it continues to occupy our land and to consolidate its hegemony in the region.  We emphasize once again that Rabin's claims are false and have no factual basis, because our movement works on our soil and we have no concern other than to fight occupation until victory and liberation.

Hamas further emphasizes its fervent desire for the security and stability of all Arab countries where the Movement's political and informational representatives are present and always operate within the framework of the laws in those countries.  Hamas is especially careful not to offer pretexts to the occupying enemy to pressure any of these countries.
Second: The authorized Hamas policy has been that the Izzidin al-Qassam Brigades target only occupation troops, their equipment, and the settlers in particular because they are reservists in the enemy army.  The Qassam Brigades have been careful, within the limits of their abilities, to ensure that no civilians are harmed as a result of military operations.

But the despotic practices of Rabin's government violate the most elementary principles of human rights, especially the policy of discriminating between the fighting holy warriors and unarmed civilians.  And they have compelled the Qassam Brigades to adopt a policy of responding in kind, a principle that is accepted by human rights laws and customs as well as revealed religions.

The latest operations at Afula and Hadera, which targeted troops and settlers but did injure some civilians, were for the purpose of deterring the barbaric Zionist aggression against our people.  They were also a legitimate retaliation for the blood of martyrs in the criminal Hebron massacre.  Nonetheless, this is not the immutable policy of the Qassam Brigades, but an extraordinary policy imposed on us by the government of the enemy.

Yet, Hamas stands ready to reconsider this extraordinary policy on condition that the prime minister of the enemy, his government, and his army pledge finally and irrevocably to cease killing unarmed Palestinian civilians.  Our goal is to guarantee the safety and security of our people by deterring murderous aggressors so that our kin may not remain easy targets for enemy soldiers and rabid hoards of settlers.  Hamas, of course, will continue its policy of resisting the occupation as long as it oppresses our land.
Third: The intensification of the sacred struggle and of the heroic operations by the holy warriors in the Qassam Brigades comes in the context of the movement's strategy to resist the occupation until it is chased away and our sacred land is liberated.

Steeped in trickery and deception and desiring to cover up the utter failure it suffered at the hands of our holy warriors, the Rabin government, in an attempt to distort the image of Hamas in the international community, maliciously claims that the operations of Hamas and its holy struggle aim to sabotage the peace and to render it worthless.

As we have declared repeatedly, Hamas does not oppose the principle of peace.  However, the peace that the government of the enemy offers is not peace but a consolidation of occupation and inequity against our people.

We realize well that the Oslo process is but a process of shameful capitulation on the part of the PLO and a submission to Zionist and American conditions and dictates.  It is also a process that carries within it the seeds of its own destruction, and its fate is one of complete failure because it is built on a false and unjust foundation.

The correct beginning [for peace] rests on the following bases.

Complete Zionist withdrawal  from our Palestinian land and the dismantling and elimination of its settlements.
Conducting general and free elections in the West Bank and Gaza to choose representatives and a leadership for our people.
The elected leadership would be the ones to articulate the hopes and goals of our people and to decide on all succeeding steps including the future of our cause.

Hamas, as it clarifies its positions to refute the allegations and utterances of the prime minister of the enemy, pledges to our people to continue on the road of holy struggle (jihad) and martyrdom until Palestine - all Palestine - is liberated.