I have received several emails from constituents asking me to support a ban of the Hamas group in its entirety.
As you may know, Hamas’ military wing has been proscribed as a terrorist organisation in the UK since 2001 and is listed in Schedule 2 of the Terrorism Act 2000. However, the Government maintains a distinction between the group’s political and military wing. I will outline below just a few of many reasons why I believe this distinction is artificial.
Legislation allows for a group to be proscribed in the UK only if the Home Secretary believes it is currently concerned in terrorism, as defined in the Terrorism Act 2000. This means an organisation can only be proscribed if it commits or participates in acts of terrorism, prepares for terrorism, promotes or encourages terrorism (including the unlawful glorification of terrorism) or is otherwise concerned in terrorism.
Hamas’ most senior political body is called the Politburo and is comprised of 15 members elected every four years. As of November 2019, six of those 15 members were designated terrorists by either the UK or US governments. This includes the Politburo’s leader, Ismail Haniyeh, who the US Department of State has said “has close links with Hamas’s military wing and has been a proponent of armed struggle, including against civilians”. Similarly, the head of the Politburo’s international relations and political guidance department, Mousa Abu Marzook, is on the UK’s consolidated list of financial sanctions in the UK and is subject to asset freezing for terrorism and terrorist financing, renewed in 2019. It is clear that the Politburo is run by individuals that have a track record of both committing and funding terrorism.
Day-to-day affairs in Gaza are overseen by Yahya Sinwar, who previously headed Hamas’s military wing and this month Saleh al-Arouri became the head of Hamas’s West Bank leadership following internal elections. He previously directed the group’s armed activities in the territory from overseas – concrete examples of Hamas militants rising through the armed wing’s ranks to become political figures.
Just last month, Haniyeh appeared on Memri TV praising Hamas’ relationships with their ‘brothers’ in Hezbollah – a proscribed terrorist organisation under UK law, and this week called the Taliban’s leader to congratulate him on the “defeat of US occupation”. This show’s Hamas’ political leaders glorifying and being concerned with terrorism.
I believe the above examples alone make a strong case for Hamas’ political wing to be proscribed under the Terrorism Act 2000 and will support measures to do so or press government if given the opportunity to do so.