Hamas: Only Ideological and Religious

By The Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center

Background Information

On March 6, 2016, Magdy Abdel Ghaffar, the Egyptian minister of the interior, held a press conference where he accused Hamas of involvement in the assassination of Hisham Barakat, the Egyptian attorney general. Egypt alleged the assassination was carried out by the Muslim Brotherhood. According to Abdel Ghaffar, Muslim Brotherhood operatives suspected of complicity in the assassination admitted they had been trained by Hamas operatives in the Gaza Strip for six weeks (Al-Youm Al-Sabaa, March 7, 2016).[1]

In an attempt to defuse the situation and regulate its relations with Egypt, the Hamas movement sent a delegation of twelve senior figures to Egypt, the first visit of its kind since Operation Protective Edge. On March 12, 2016, the members of the delegation met with Khaled Fawzy, the head of Egyptian General Intelligence. The meeting apparently did not have a practical outcome. Another meeting was held with senior Egyptian General Intelligence officials on March 27, 2016. At that meeting the Egyptian authorities apparently exerted pressure on Hamas to stop its support of jihadist operatives and to sever all ties with the Muslim Brotherhood, accused by the Egyptian regime of involvement in the anti-Egyptian terrorist campaign.

Hamas' Response.....

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