Could Hamas Target the West?

Abstract

A violent Islamist organization, Hamas, is also a nationalist movement that holds “resistance” to Israel as its highest goal. Unlike global terrorist groups such as Al Qaeda, Hamas has traditionally confined its violent activities to the local arena comprising Israel, the Gaza Strip, and the West Bank. While citizens of Western countries have been killed in Hamas' indiscriminate suicide bombings, Hamas has not taken its violent campaign abroad targeting Israeli diplomats or Western allies. Indeed, several layers of disincentives mitigate against Hamas targeting Israeli interests abroad or targeting Western interests. But under what conditions might Hamas be prepared to target Western interests? The answer to this question requires a level of analysis approach that considers Hamas as an organization, as a conglomerate of semi-independent cells, and as a wellspring for rogue cells and independent actors, with these last two entities posing the greatest future threat. Contrary to conventional wisdom, there is precedent for Hamas considering the attacks on Israeli interests abroad and on Western interests themselves. In final analysis, the author believes Hamas unlikely to attack Western interests in the short term. But the following analysis reveals that under certain conditions Hamas' attack calculus could change in the future.