Hamas's Hudna

There have been a few stories in the press about Hamas offering a cease-fire to Israel. It is important to understand what the idea of cease-fire means to them. David Bedein shows what Hamas really means, and what they say in Arabic.

Sheikh Yusef stated to the Israeli media that the "hudna" that he suggested would last for ten years.

Yet "hudna", often mistranslated as a “ceasefire” or armistice, connotes no more than a temporary respite in the war between Islamic forces and non-Islamic forces.

The authoritative Islamic Encyclopedia (London, 1922) defines "hudna" as a “temporary treaty” which can be approved or abrogated by Islamic religious leaders, depending on whether or not it serves the interests of Islam, and that a “hudna” cannot last for more than ten years. The Islamic Encyclopedia mentions the Hudaybia treaty as the ultimate “hudna.” Arafat also referred to a hudna in his speeches when he would refer to the Oslo accords. In the words of the Islamic encyclopedia, “The Hudaybia treaty, concluded by the Prophet Muhammed with the unbelievers of Mecca in 628, provided a precedent for subsequent treaties which the Prophet’s successors made with non-Muslims. Muhammed made a hudna with a tribe of Jews back then to give him time to grow his forces, then broke the treaty and wiped them out. Although this treaty was violated within three years from the time that it was concluded, most jurists concur that the maximum period of peace with the enemy should not exceed ten years since it was originally agreed that the Hudaybia treaty should last ten years.”

It is clear from their statements and their fundamentalist reading of the Koran that Hamas's goal is to destroy Israel, no matter what they say to Western journalists.