The baffling statement recently made by French President Emmanuel Macron, claiming that “Hamas has never been active in the West Bank”, has sent shockwaves through security establishments, academic circles, and the general public in Israel and around the globe. This assertion exposed a profound chasm from reality, and above all, a complete disregard for the solid historical and intelligence-based facts accumulated over nearly forty years.

A thorough examination of the history of the terrorist organization Hamas in the West Bank reveals an opposite reality: the organization has been operating, entrenching itself, funding operations, and directing attacks in the heart of the land since its inception in the late 1980s.

The Stages of Hamas’s Entrenchment in the West Bank: A Four-Decade History

1. The Roots of Civilian Infrastructure (The 1980s and 1990s)

Hamas did not materialize out of a vacuum. Upon its establishment in the late 1980s, during the outbreak of the First Intifada, the organization invested immense resources in building a broad civilian infrastructure across the West Bank, a network of........

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