AHMED YASSIN: HAMAS
FOUNDER, 1938-2004
March 22, 2004
By: ICEJ News
Hamas cleric dubbed
“a mastermind of evil and preacher of death”
Hamas spiritual
leader Sheikh Ahmed Yassin stood alongside the worst of Israel's
enemies throughout history, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon told a
meeting of Likud Ministers Monday, several hours after Israeli
helicopters fired three missiles at the Hamas leader's car,
killing him and seven of his bodyguards instantly.
"The state of
Israel today hit the first and foremost head of Palestinian
terrorism. His ideological basis was the murder of Jews and the
destruction of Israel. He stood alongside the worst of Israel's
enemies throughout the ages," Sharon said, according to The
Jerusalem Post.
Born in 1938,
Yassin’s family 
fled their native
village south of Tel Aviv during the 1948 war of independence and
Ahmed maintained a life-long repudiation of the right of Israel
to exist on Islamic theological grounds. In the weeks that
followed the outbreak of the first intifada in December 1987,
Yassin founded Hamas hoping to wrest control of the Palestinian
street from Yasser Arafat’s Tunis-based PLO and its
governing Fatah movement. Considered the Palestinian branch of
Egypt’s radical Muslim Brotherhood, Hamas adopted a charter
that calls for the destruction of Israel and setting up of an
Islamic state in all “Palestine.” The group contrasted
a purist, ascetic brand of Islam to the widespread corruption and
secularism of Fatah, leading to frequent clashes with the
Palestinian Authority under Arafat. Having been imprisoned twice
in Israel, in 1984 and 1989, where he received a life sentence
for involvement in the murder of two Israeli soldiers, Yassin was
released in a 1997 deal with Jordan after Israeli Mossad agents
attempted and failed to kill Khaled Mashaal, head of the Hamas
“political bureau” in Amman.
Yassin then
returned to the Gaza Strip from where he resumed direct
financial, operational and spiritual leadership for the movement,
touring Arab countries in 1998 with the explicit aim of raising
millions of dollars in financial aid to help Hamas carry out its
widespread terrorist and humanitarian operations.
During his public
speeches and interviews, Yassin repeatedly called for continuing
the “armed struggle” and carrying out terrorist
attacks, recently issuing a religious edict authorizing the use
of female bombers for Hamas suicide missions.
Nevertheless,
despite Israeli threats against him, and a previous assassination
attempt which he and the Hamas military leadership narrowly
survived in September 2003, Yassin never changed his routine.
Every morning, he would attend pre-dawn prayers at the local
mosque in the Sabra neighborhood of Gaza City. He died shortly
after leaving the same mosque at 5.30am Monday when three Israeli
missiles slammed into his car, killing him instantly.
Crippled and
wheelchair bound since childhood, it was widely regarded that the
man Israel labeled the leading Palestinian “terrorist
mastermind” would be immune from such a direct pre-dawn
attack due to his status as an Islamic spiritual leader and the
Israeli fear of revenge.
But Israeli Foreign
Ministry spokesman Mark Sofer dismissed the notion in its
entirety. “[Yassin] was not a spiritual leader. This term
does injustice to the term 'spiritual leader' and an insult to
real spiritual leaders. He was a terrorist mastermind,” he
said.
In Ramallah, PA
officials condemned the attack. "This is a crazy and very
dangerous act. It opens the door wide to chaos. Yassin is known
for his moderation and he was controlling Hamas and therefore
this is a dangerous, cowardly act," said Prime Minister
Ahmed Qurei.
But according to
IDF Spokesperson Ruth Yaron to call a man who used human bombs a
moderate is ludicrous. "Ahmed Yassin for us was the
embodiment of terror, she said.
"The Israeli
air force this morning killed the mastermind of all evil, Ahmed
Yassin, who was a preacher of death," she said.
Palestinian leader
Yasser Arafat declared three days of mourning for the
quadriplegic sheik and said the Israelis had "crossed all
red lines." His prime minister, Ahmed Qurei, called the
killing "one of the biggest crimes that the Israeli
government has committed."
Yassin is by far
the most senior Palestinian leader killed in the past three and a
half years of terrorist conflict. In response to his unyielding
rejectionist attitude and the almost unrelenting Hamas attacks,
Israel marked Yassin for death, with the cabinet itself voting in
favor of the strike, and Sharon personally being updated of its
progress at home in his Negev ranch.
"The war on
terror is not over, and will take place every day and in every
place,” Sharon declared Monday after news of Yassin’s
death was broadcast around the world. “It is the natural
right of the Jewish nation, as it is the right of any peoples, to
hunt down those who wish to exterminate them," he said.
fled their native
village south of Tel Aviv during the 1948 war of independence and
Ahmed maintained a life-long repudiation of the right of Israel
to exist on Islamic theological grounds. In the weeks that
followed the outbreak of the first intifada in December 1987,
Yassin founded Hamas hoping to wrest control of the Palestinian
street from Yasser Arafat’s Tunis-based PLO and its
governing Fatah movement. Considered the Palestinian branch of
Egypt’s radical Muslim Brotherhood, Hamas adopted a charter
that calls for the destruction of Israel and setting up of an
Islamic state in all “Palestine.” The group contrasted
a purist, ascetic brand of Islam to the widespread corruption and
secularism of Fatah, leading to frequent clashes with the
Palestinian Authority under Arafat. Having been imprisoned twice
in Israel, in 1984 and 1989, where he received a life sentence
for involvement in the murder of two Israeli soldiers, Yassin was
released in a 1997 deal with Jordan after Israeli Mossad agents
attempted and failed to kill Khaled Mashaal, head of the Hamas
“political bureau” in Amman.