Hamas

Harakat al-Muqawama al-Islamiyya (HAMAS or Hamas) is an Iran-backed Islamist terror group formed during the First Intifada in 1987. The Palestinian group is avowed to the destruction of the State of Israel and aims to establish an independent Islamic Palestinian state through militant action. Hamas has ruled the Gaza Strip since 2007, following the violent overthrow of its rival, Fatah, and two years after Israel’s Disengagement from Gaza in 2005. 

Hamas also operates in the West Bank and has a presence in Palestinian refugee camps in Lebanon. Its leaders have been based in Qatar, Turkey, Syria and Egypt. Over the years, the group has carried out suicide bombings of civilian sites, kidnappings, shootings and car-ramming attacks against military forces and civilians. 

In its largest attack to date, Hamas-led terrorists killed about 1,200 people in a multi-pronged terror onslaught on southern Israel on October 7, 2023, and abducted over 250 hostages, mostly civilians including young children and an infant. 

The U.S., Canada, the European Union, the U.K. and others designate Hamas as a terrorist organization.