What Is This World Coming To?

The Jerusalem Post is reporting, under the curiously-worded headline, “Palestinian factions in Gaza agree in principle to cease-fire” that about a dozen small Palestinian factions ‘agreed in principle’ to a ceasefire with Israel.

What made the headline ‘curiously-worded’ was that the report later explained that it wasn’t really a ‘cease-fire’ at all, but rather, a ‘hudna’. What is a hudna?

Hudna: The prophet closed a ten-year weapon break with the Quraysh. Two years later though it was broken unilaterely to strike the Quraysh and Muhammad entered in Mecca. Since that time the term “Hudna” designates a strategic cessation of hostilities, which has alone the sense of a force misalignment. A “Hudna” can be interrupted then, as soon as this force misalignment is smoothed finally and the way for a Muslim victory is foreseen. - WikiIslam

“Hamas legislator Mushir al-Masri said Tuesday that a truce with Israel would not be possible unless all the Palestinian groups agreed to it.

“We won’t go to a hudna [temporary truce] unless there is a consensus among the Palestinians about it,” he said. “We are aware that some groups are opposed to a truce, but don’t believe that the major factions would reject a mutual and comprehensive truce that would end the siege imposed on the Gaza Strip.” - Jerusalem Post.

A ‘hudna’ is a ‘cease-fire’ that, by both implication and design, only advantages one side. The purpose of a hudna is not the pursuit of peace, or even a permanent truce. The purpose of a hudna is obtain a lull in the fighting long enough to rearm, regroup and resume hostilities.

Under the terms of a hudna, Israel is bound to a cease-fire until that cease-fire is broken by the Islamic side — which reserves the right to break it with impunity. Just as Mohammed never intended to keep his hudna with the Quryash at Mecca, Hamas is making clear it has no intention of keeping it’s with Israel.

Mohammed’s hudna did not obligate him to peacefully co-exist with the Quryash. It obligated the Quryash not to attack him until he was ready.

“The Hamas leader pointed out that his movement had accepted a cease-fire with Israel in 2005. “Hamas benefited from that truce and no one can deny this,” he said. “Even those who opposed the previous truce have admitted that it was useful.”

The unspoken rest of the sentence goes like this: “and when its usefulness had ended, we resumed the war.”