Hamas softens stance on Israel, Muslim Brotherhood

The Palestinian Islamist group Hamas will drop its longstanding call for Israel's destruction as well as its association with the Muslim Brotherhood, in a policy document to be issued on Monday, Gulf Arab sources said.

Hamas' move appears aimed at improving relations with Gulf Arab states and Egypt, which label the Brotherhood a terrorist organisation, and mending a rift with the main Palestinian faction headed by President Mahmoud Abbas. It comes two days before Abbas is due in Washington, and days after President Donald Trump told Reuters he may travel to Israel in May and sees no reason why there should not be peace between Israel and the Palestinians.

But the document, to be announced later on Monday, will still reject Israel's right to exist and back armed struggle against it, said the Gulf Arab sources. Israel rejected the reported shift, calling it an attempt by Hamas to delude the world that it was becoming more moderate.

"Hamas is attempting to fool the world but it will not succeed," said David Keyes, a spokesman for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. "They dig terror tunnels and have launched thousands upon thousands of missiles at Israeli civilians," he said. "This is the real Hamas."

DECADES OF CONFLICT

Founded in 1987 as an offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood, the banned Egyptian Islamist movement, Hamas has fought three wars with Israel since 2007 and has carried out hundreds of armed attacks in Israel and in Israeli-occupied territories. Many Western countries classify it as a terrorist group over its failure to renounce violence, recognise Israel's right to exist and accept existing interim Israeli-Palestinian peace agreements.

The Gulf Arab sources said Hamas, which has controlled the Gaza Strip since 2007, will say in the document that it agrees to a transitional Palestinian state along the borders from 1967, when Israel captured Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem in a war with Arab states. Israel withdrew from Gaza in 2005. A state along 1967 borders is the goal of Hamas' main political rival, the Fatah movement led by Abbas. His Palestinian Authority has engaged in peace talks with Israel on that basis, although the last, United States(US) mediated round collapsed in 2014.

It remained unclear whether the document replaces or changes in any way Hamas's 1988 charter, which calls for Israel's destruction and is the Islamist group's covenant. Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri told Reuters the group's acceptance of a transitional Palestinian state along 1967 borders was an attempt to reach a consensus with other Palestinian factions.

But, he said, "unlike Fatah, Hamas does not accept Israel's right to exist on the rest of the land. Hamas's constant position is not to cede any of our historical rights and not to recognise the (Israeli) occupation." There was no immediate comment from Egypt and Gulf Arab states. "For Hamas ... it's a signal of their desire to align with conservative Sunni elements in the region and create some immunity," said Beverley Milton-Edwards, a visiting fellow at the Brookings Doha Centre and author of a book on Hamas.

But she said while the document could strengthen Hamas's position in the Palestinian Territories and the Middle East, it would "unlikely lead to any definitive swing in opinion against them in the US or even Europe."

US-allied Arab states including Egypt, the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia classify the Muslim Brotherhood a terrorist organisation. The 89-year-old Brotherhood held power in Egypt for a year after a popular uprising in 2011, but was then removed by the army after mass street protests. The Brotherhood denies links with Islamist militants and advocates Islamist political parties winning power through elections, which Saudi Arabia considers a threat to its system of absolute power through inherited rule.