Inside Hamas

SUNGSU CHO/POLARIS FOR TIME
THE FACE OF TERROR: Hamas operatives like these activists lead lives so secret that their militant identities are often hidden from their own families

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The initial operations of his cell were amateurish, he conceded. When darkness fell, his little group would don camouflage outfits and black face masks, strap on AK-47s with three or four magazines apiece, grab a few hand grenades or rockets and head for the fringes of one of the 20 Israeli settlements laced into the Gaza Strip. Sometimes they would hit something, often not. "We'd try to shoot settlers or the soldiers guarding the houses. Or we'd fire Qassams at them," he said, referring to the crude short-range rocket called the Qassam II that Hamas began making in 2002.

As their skills improved, cell members began to map out more sophisticated attacks. They would mark a target an Israeli tank, say and reconnoiter its movements until they knew its daily routine. Then Mohammed would convene a brief, secret meeting in a mosque with a higher-ranking commander to present the plan and request necessary armaments. Mohammed would then leave a message in a dead drop for a bombmaking unit to supply the handmade remote-control explosives Mohammed's men would use. Once, Mohammed recalled, he planted a mine and stayed for three days in a nearby hideout, holding the firing fuse until the chosen tank came by and he blew it up. Mohammed was particularly proud of the killing of a settlement resident that took four months to plot, and required his team members to disguise themselves as Orthodox Jews. As ranking members died, Mohammed moved up to management. He took charge of a cell, planning broader tactics and approving operations inside the tightly guarded perimeters of the Gaza Strip. Mohammed told me he was prepared to fight indefinitely, "100 years, if need be."

His career turned out to be far shorter. The man I later learned was Ahmed Ishtawi had been unduly modest about his murderous accomplishments. According to his post-death biography, he was a natural leader who had developed a strong following during the three years he headed the student-council social committee at Gaza University, where he doled out charity to poor students. According to the leaflet his brother Hosam later showed me, Ahmed Ishtawi led the first successful destruction of an Israeli tank in Gaza and rose to assistant to the al-Qassam Brigade's former general commander. He was in charge of bringing huge quantities of weapons into Gaza. After the big Israeli incursion of 2002 broke down Hamas' strength in the West Bank, destroying chapters and freezing communications, he reconnected and remobilized the militant network there, passed them money, brought them up-to-date technology for making rockets and bombs, and served as their link back to the leadership in Gaza.

Hosam saw his brother the day his name appeared in Ma'ariv's deck of cards. "He just laughed," said Hosam, "and said, 'Why not?'" As Ishtawi turned to leave that night two days before his assassination he gave some last advice to his brother. "He told me not to fight Israel because you hate the Israelis, hate the Jews. He said to fight because we have the right to liberate our lands and win our freedom."

When an operative like Ishtawi dies, Hamas has teams of dedicated recruiters to replenish its army. In Gaza, I met one of them, a man who gave his name only as Walid. He arranged to talk to me one afternoon in a nondescript downtown office. For the past three years he has trawled the mosques of Gaza, looking for devout Muslims who might make good Hamas militants. You don't apply for military duty in the al-Qassam Brigade; Hamas chooses you. Walid, who is 27, has never been a fighter. Indeed, with his thick glasses and reticent manner he resembles a well-educated accountant, which is, in fact, his public job. But Walid and scores like him play a critical role in replenishing the killing machine.

Walid looks for new recruits by talking to "people at the mosque about the current situation," in other words, by preaching the Hamas message. When Walid spots an impressive candidate, he reports the person's name and qualifications to a superior, who makes the actual approach. The division of labor ensures that if Walid were to be captured by the Israelis, he wouldn't be able to identify those selected for militant operations.

Most are chosen first of all for their unswerving devotion to Hamas ideology. At a Gaza funeral last month, I encountered Salama Hamad. That is his real name, and he allowed me to use it since the Israelis already know all about him. He is a big, hulking man with supersize hands and graying hair cropped to the skull. At 32, he has been a member of Hamas for 15 years, a militant in al-Qassam for 12 and a fugitive the entire time. He has five children he sees "from time to time."