371 Beatriz Gutiérrez López The Muqawama (Resistance): The Case of Hamas were intended to prevent occupant Israeli forces from controlling security. In addition, and especially during the wars of 2008-2009 and 2014, when the Al-Qassam Brigades tried to create rocket attacks of such an intensity that Israel was forced to intervene in Gaza with its ground forces, thus luring the enemy into densely populated and unfamiliar hostile territory, after the traumatic experience of the Battle of Jenin in the Jenin refugee camp in 2002.40 Hamas’s unsuccessful operations in the two Gaza wars that involved an invasion by Israeli ground forces was based on the division of the land into three concentric circles: the first and outer circle was protected with explosives, mortar shells and landmines; the second, middle circle contained the outskirts of towns and was protected with improvised explosive devices (IEDs) and snipers, and the innermost circle, comprising the largest towns, and especially Gaza, was protected by a network of tunnels (vide supra) with IEDs, buildings containing explosives, ambushes and snipers, in a bid to force the Israeli troops to fight in an urban environment that would prove very difficult because it was unfamiliar and hostile, and was also extremely challenging from the point of view of operations and the protection of the civilian population.41 4.2. Fighting procedures: asymmetry as a weapon The muqawama doctrine advocates the use of asymmetric warfare between belligerents, thus taking advantage of the enemy’s weaknesses and being able to adapt in order to exploit any vulnerability that might emerge. It was this ability to adapt that first led to the exploitation of the Israelis’ terror of losing civilian lives in what have become known as “martyr operations” or suicide bombings, which were probably first used during the deportations to Lebanon in 1992, and which, as pointed out earlier, were Hamas’s main fighting tactic between 1994 and 2005. However, the organisation was forced to readapt on account of three counterinsurgency actions taken by Israel: Operation Defensive Shield in April 2002, which was an attempt to stop terrorist attacks in the West Bank; the construction of a wall to separate the West Bank and Israel in spring 2005 and Israel’s unilateral withdrawal from the Gaza Strip in August 40 Operation Defensive Shield (April 2002) in Jenin refugee camp was the first time the united effort of Palestinian forces was put to the test (bearing in mind that Hamas, Islamic Jihad, the militias of al-Fatah, Tanzim and the Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades all fought in a coordinated manner). It was also the first time the Israeli army found itself fighting in densely populated areas and in an urban environment inside Palestine. During the battle, Palestinian insurgent groups, and especially Hamas, made ample use of IEDs on roads, houses, furniture and vehicles to attract the attention of the Israeli forces and then detonated them in their path. In BYMAN. Op. Cit., 146. 41 COHEN, Yoram; WHITE, Jeffrey. “Hamas in Combat”, Policy Focus no. 97, October 2009, Washington Institute for Near East Policy, 2009, p. 11. http://revista.ieee.es/index.php/ieee
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