Haaretz: Meshal Loses Control of Hamas’ Military Wing
Hamas political bureau head Khaled Meshal, who now resides in Qatar, is expected to keep his post after an internal vote by the organization’s leadership later this month. But sources have told Haaretz that Hamas leaders have decided to transfer some of Meshal’s critical areas of authority to the leadership in the Gaza Strip, including control of the organization’s budget and of its military wing.
Meshal’s sole control of Hamas’ purse strings has effectively given him control over Iz al-Din al-Qassam, the Gaza-based military wing of Hamas. The shift that now seems to be in the pipeline is part of the reorganization of Hamas, since the movement’s leadership left Damascus in the wake of the unrest in Syria. Meshal moved to Qatar, while Moussa Abu Marzouk, his deputy and one of his rivals, went to Cairo.
Other members of the movement’s leadership body are now scattered among Khartoum, Istanbul, Gaza, Cairo and Doha. The Gaza Strip remains home to many Hamas militants and to its main sources of revenue, including tax collection and the smuggling tunnels under the border with Egypt. Gaza has also become Hamas’ main decision-making center over the past several months.
Hamas denied a recent report in Haaretz on the results of a secret election to the politburo and the Shura Council, the organization’s political and decision-making council, held about three weeks ago. But senior officials in the movement have continued to confirm that Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh won by a significant margin, effectively becoming the head of the movement in the Gaza Strip. The top spot has been empty since the assassination in 2004 of Abdel Aziz Rantisi. Rounding out the top three positions are Imad al-Alami, who only recently arrived in Gaza after fleeing Syria, and Khalil al-Hayeh.
For more, go to Haaretz.com
A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you move on, I wanted to ask you to support the Forward’s award-winning journalism during our High Holiday Monthly Donor Drive.
If you’ve turned to the Forward in the past 12 months to better understand the world around you, we hope you will support us with a gift now. Your support has a direct impact, giving us the resources we need to report from Israel and around the U.S., across college campuses, and wherever there is news of importance to American Jews.
Make a monthly or one-time gift and support Jewish journalism throughout 5785. The first six months of your monthly gift will be matched for twice the investment in independent Jewish journalism.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
