Hamas to recognize 1967 borders, reject Brotherhood

CAIRO – 12 March 2017: The Palestinian Islamic Resistance Movement, Hamas, will recognize for the first time the pre-1967 borders as the borders of a future Palestinian state but will not recognize an Israeli state, London-based newswire Asharq Al-Awsat

reported

Wednesday.

Recognizing the 1967 borders is a major divergence from the Islamic movement’s known political line, which speaks of a Palestinian state “from the [Jordan] River to the [Mediterranean] Sea,” according to

Hamas’ fundamental convention

.

The ‘

1967 Lines

’ refers to the armistice lines from before June 1967’s Six Day War, when Israel captured the Gaza Strip from Egypt and the West Bank and East Jerusalem from Jordan, along with other territories, expanding its territory beyond the "

Green Line

" borders delineated by a 1949 armistice between Israel and its Arab neighbors.

According to Asharq Al-Awsat’s report, Hamas is formulating a new outline of its policies which will also include the movement’s separation from any foreign organization, in reference to the Muslim Brotherhood and another break from its current political line.

In the second article of its current

convention

Hamas says it is part of the Muslim Brotherhood and is its wing in Palestinian lands.

A researcher at Al-Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies, Akram Alfy, told Egypt Today that ending relations between Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood will not be easy as it will demand not only organizational but also ideological separation.

Alfy said Hamas’ new outline could be considered an attempt to extend a hand to the Egyptian regime and enhance its relations with “moderate” Arab countries in the Arabian Gulf. It may be, said Alfy, that Hamas has “decided to behave wisely because it's now the ruling regime” in Gaza and needs to deal with regional and international powers, such as the U.S. under President Donald Trump, which Alfy said is “behaving badly” against the Brotherhood.

"Running in the 2006 parliamentary elections was recognition of the Palestinian National Authority and the Oslo Accords,” Alfy said. “[Speaking of] a Palestinian state from ‘river to sea’ is just way to speak to the youth, but [any reality of] it ended a long time ago.”

Hamas was founded in 1987 by Sheikh Ahmed Yassin and a number of Palestinian Muslim Brotherhood members, including Abdulaziz Alrantisy and Mahmoud Elzahar.

Due to its role in establishing the Palestinian jihadist movement, Hamas declared itself the Palestinian wing of the Brotherhood. Since its beginning Hamas has been vocal about its hatred of Israel and has never recognized it.