This report is part of MEMRI’s repository of contemporary and historical foundational documents of the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) movement.
The International Union of Muslim Scholars (IUMS), an arm of the Qatari regime for disseminating extremist Islamist, anti-Western and antisemitic ideology,[1] maintains close ties with the terrorist organization Hamas, in line with Qatar’s decades-long policy of supporting terrorist organizations around the world. Both the IUMS and Hamas are closely affiliated with the Muslim Brotherhood (MB), whose branches in Lebanon, Egypt, and Jordan were designated by the U.S. as terrorist on January 13, 2026, with a similar designation being considered by the E.U.[2]
The IUMS was established in 2004 by Sheikh Yousuf Al-Qaradawi (1926-2022), a spiritual leader of the MB known for his positions in favor of jihad and terrorism, who, as a major religious authority, also provided religious sanction for the suicide attacks carried out by Hamas.[3] Hamas itself is a branch of the MB, as stated in its 1988 charter and confirmed by its leaders.[4] Over the years, senior figures in this terrorist organization maintained ongoing ties with Al-Qaradawi, and several of them were or still are members of the IUMS, most notably Isma’il Haniyeh, the head of Hamas’s political bureau who was assassinated in Tehran in July 2024.
Furthermore, in 2012 the IUMS established a branch in the Gaza Strip, headed by senior Hamas figure Marwan Abu Ras, who was a member of the Palestinian Legislative Council on behalf of Hamas. The executive council of the Union’s Gaza branch includes Hamas members and figures in Hamas’s administration in the Strip. The IUMS and its members regularly express unreserved support for Hamas and its terrorist activities against Israelis, including for the October 7, 2023 attack,[5] for which they provided religious support.[6]
The following is an overview of the close, ongoing, and institutionalized network of ties between the Hamas leadership and the IUMS, which encompasses ideological affinity, active membership of Hamas officials in the Union, personal connections with its founder Sheikh Yousuf Al-Qaradawi, as well as the establishment of an official branch of the IUMS in the Gaza Strip, managed by Hamas members.
Ties Between Hamas Officials And IUMS Founder Sheikh Yousuf Al-Qaradawi
As stated, senior Hamas officials maintained close ties over the years with IUMS founder Sheikh Yousuf Al-Qaradawi, a major spiritual leader of Hamas’s parent movement, the MB, who lived and operated in Qatar. Al-Qaradawi was known for his support for the suicide attacks carried out by Hamas as part of its struggle against Israel, and he frequently incited the Muslim world with extremist content during his weekly program on Qatar’s Al Jazeera channel.
In February 2012, a delegation of Hamas leaders visited Al-Qaradawi’s home in the Qatari capital of Doha.[7] Among them was Yahya Sinwar, who had been released from an Israeli prison only several months previously, and who would later become Hamas’s leader in the Gaza Strip and the architect of the October 7 attack.
October 7 architect Yahya Sinwar visiting the home of Sheikh Yousuf Al-Qaradawi in Doha (paltimeps.ps, February 3, 2012)
Isma’il Haniyeh, then Hamas prime minister, visiting the home of Sheikh Yousuf Al-Qaradawi (paltimeps.ps, February 3, 2012)
In May 2013, Al-Qaradawi came to the Gaza Strip at the head of a delegation of dozens of IUMS members and was received with great honor by Hamas’s prime minister at the time, Isma’il Haniyeh.[8]
Isma’il Haniyeh, then Hamas prime minister, welcoming Sheikh Yousuf Al-Qaradawi on his visit to Gaza (Aljazeera.net, May 9, 2013)
Senior Hamas leaders Khaled Mash’al (second from left), Moussa Abu Marzouk (fourth from left), and Izzat Al-Rishq (far right) at the home of Yousuf Al-Qaradawi (third from left) during Eid Al-Fitr, 2018 (X.com/alqaradawy, June 16, 2018)
Yousuf al-Qaradawi (center) with IUMS board member Muhammad Al-Saghir (right) and Hamas official Khaled Mash’al, at a mourning tent in Qatar for former Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi, of the MB (Facebook.com/AJA.Egypt, June 20, 2019)
Al-Qaradawi’s funeral in Doha was attended by Hamas officials, including the organization’s chairman abroad, Khaled Mash’al, and political bureau member Izzat Al-Rishq. In his eulogy for Al-Qaradawi, Mash’al said: “This is a sacred and immense occasion in honor of a great man who devoted his entire life to Allah and was a source of authority in all fields of knowledge, action, and jihad… I knew Sheikh Yousuf Al-Qaradawi for about forty years. He was a father not only to his own sons and daughters but to all of us – to me and to all members of my generation. We are [all] his students, proud to have studied under him… The Muslim students of [MB founder Hassan] Al-Banna and of Al-Qaradawi, followers of the wasati [middle-road] school [of Islam], charted [a path] for the processions of jihad fighters who came to Palestine from Egypt, Syria, and Jordan. And today, we extend our condolences to Egypt, Al-Qaradawi’s birthplace, as well as Qatar, which embraced him, and the entire [Islamic] nation, which made him its leader.”[9]
Khaled Mash’al speaking at Al-Qaradawi’s funeral; behind him on the left is Hamas official Izzat Al-Rishq (Al-sharq.com, September 27, 2022)
Hamas Officials Who Are IUMS Members
Several Hamas officials were or are members of the IUMS. Most notable among these is slain Hamas political bureau chief Isma’il Haniyeh. During his February 2012 visit to Doha, as Hamas’s prime minister in Gaza, Haniyeh met with IUMS chairman and founder Yousuf Al-Qaradawi at the organization’s headquarters. The meeting was also attended by Ali Al-Qaradaghi, then IUMS secretary-general and today its chairman, who presented Haniyeh with a certificate of membership in the Union.[10]
Right: Haniyeh with Al-Qaradaghi; Left: Ismail Haniyeh’s IUMS membership certificate (Paltimesps.ps, February 4, 2012)
Haniyeh remained an honored member of the IUMS even after the October 7 attack. On January 9, 2024, three months after the attack, during the IUMS’s general assembly in Doha, a conference of Islamic scholars was held under the title “The Al-Aqsa Flood and the Role of the Islamic Nation.”[11] Haniyah attended the conference and delivered a speech in which he praised the “resistance front” of Hamas’s fighters in Gaza, describing them “a source of pride for all members of the Islamic nation.” He also called for arming them, asserting: “This is the battle of the Al-Aqsa [Mosque], not just a battle of the Palestinian people.”[12] The Islamic scholars who attended the conference praised the “blessed jihad of all of the Palestinian resistance factions,”[13] a reference to the October 7 massacres, in which non-Hamas armed factions also participated.
Haniyeh’s speech at the conference (Iumsonline.org, January 9, 2024).
Another member of Hamas’s political bureau abroad, Abd Al-Jabbar Sa’id, who is a lecturer at the Shari’a faculty at Qatar University, is also a member of the IUMS.[14]
2008 conference of the Qatar University Shari’a faculty. Abd Al-Jabbar Sa’id can be seen on the left wearing a suit; current IUMS chairman Ali Al-Qaradaghi can be seen sitting fourth from the right (Qspace.qu.edu.qa, November 26, 2008)
Another Hamas official with IUMS membership is Nawaf Takruri, a Hamas founder who was among the 415 members of the organization expelled by Israel to southern Lebanon in December 1992, following increased Palestinian terror activity that culminated with the kidnap and murder of Israeli border police officer Nissim Toledano.[15] Takruri would later serve as the chief of Hamas’s Popular Activities Office in Syria.[16] He is today the chairman of the Association of Palestinian Scholars, which is affiliated with Hamas, and a member of the executive council of the IUMS.
Nawaf Takruri (left) with current IUMS chairman Ali Al-Qaradaghi (at the podium) at a pro-Hamas conference in Istanbul. (Facebook.com/iumsonline, August 20, 2025)
A Hamas Official Is Chief Of The Gaza-Based Palestinian Branch Of The IUMS
As mentioned, in 2012 a Palestinian branch of the IUMS was established in the Gaza Strip.[17] The branch is headed by Marwan Abu Ras, a prominent Hamas official who was also a member of the Palestinian Legislative Council on behalf of Hamas. In addition, Abu Ras is chairman of the IUMS’s Committee for Jerusalem and Palestine Affairs.[18] The secretary of the IUMS’s Palestinian branch is Hamas official Muhammad Suleiman Al-Farra, the son of Suleiman Al-Farra, from the organization’s founding generation.[19] Another member of the IUMS branch in Gaza is Salem Ahmad Salameh, who was a member of the Palestinian Legislative Council on behalf of Hamas. He too was among the 415 terror organization members expelled by Israel to southern Lebanon in 1992.[20] The executive council of the IUMS branch in Gaza includes Hamas members Abd Al-Karim Al-Dahshan,[21] prominent Hamas women’s movement member Sumaya Al-Dahshan,[22] and Walid Ahmad Hussein Oweidha, who was a director in Hamas’s endowments ministry in the Gaza Strip.[23]
Marwan Abu Ras (center) at a ceremony marking the end of an IUMS educational course in Gaza in 2016. To his right is Hamas political bureau member and then chairman of the Gaza parliament Ahmad Bahr (Facebook.com/etehadolamap, April 14, 2016)
Meetings And Personal Ties Between IUMS Members And Hamas Officials
It also appears that there is regular close contact between IUMS members and Hamas officials. For instance, IUMS members often meet with Hamas members living in Qatar. Take, for example, the January 2024 meeting on the sidelines of the IUMS general assembly in Qatar. During this meeting IUMS members conveyed their condolences to then Hamas political bureau chief Isma’il Haniyeh on the death of Hamas deputy chief Salah Al-Arouri, who had been killed in an Israeli airstrike in Lebanon a few days earlier. They also paid their respects to the “martyrs of the Palestinian people and their jihad fighters,” praising and supporting the “heroism of the resistance.”[24]
In April 2023, another meeting was held in Doha, initiated by then IUMS secretary-general Ali Al-Qaradaghi (currently the Union’s chairman), between IUMS members and a delegation of Hamas officials, including Haniyeh, Hamas leader abroad Khaled Mash’al, and Hamas political bureau members Moussa Abu Marzouk and Khalil Al-Haya. During the meeting, the IUMS members expressed support for the “resistance” and for Hamas’s role in it.[25]
In June 2022, during a visit by Haniyeh and Hamas political bureau member Khalil Al-Haya in Turkey, the two attended a meeting at the IUMS’s Istanbul office. The meeting was also attended by Al-Qaradaghi, by then IUMS deputy chairman Issam Al-Bashir, and by IUMS board member Muhammad Al-Hassan Al-Dadou.[26]
Hamas political bureau member Khalil Al-Haya (second from right) and slain Hamas political bureau chief Isma’il Haniyeh (fourth from right) visiting the IUMS office in Istanbul (Alresalah.ps, June 5, 2022)
[2][2] On January 22, 2026, the French parliament approved by a large majority a resolution calling on the E.U. to list the MB as a terrorist organization. On the same day, this decision was welcomed by the European Conservatives and Reformists Group in the European Parliament, which announced that it would support measures to advance this initiative (arabmubasher.com, ecrgroup.eu, January 22, 2026).
[3] Sheikh Yousuf Al-Qaradawi, originally from Egypt, settled in Qatar in the 1960s and developed close ties with the Qatari ruling family. He worked to promote the emirate’s status as an Islamic powerhouse by establishing the Faculty of Islamic Studies at Qatar University, hosting the popular Sharia and Life program on Al-Jazeera TV, and establishing the IUMS under the auspices of Qatar and with its funding. His views made him a controversial figure in the Muslim world, and a number of Arab countries designated him as a terrorist. He was also denied entry to several Western countries, including the U.S. His successors as heads of the IUMS, Ahmad Al-Raissouni and the current head, Ali Al-Qaradaghi, continue to express similar views in favor of jihad and terror. On Al-Qaradawi, see MEMRI reports:
Inquiry & Analysis Series No. 1652, Al-Qaradawi: Qatar’s Islamist Empire Builder, October 3, 2022; Inquiry & Analysis No. 53 – Debating the Religious, Political and Moral Legitimacy of Suicide Bombings Part 1: The Debate over Religious Legitimacy, May 3, 2001;
Special Dispatch No. 542, Al-Qaradawi Speaks In Favor of Suicide Operations at an Islamic Conference in Sweden, July 24, 2003; Clip No. 3841 – Leading Sunni Scholar Al-Qaradhawi in Visit to Gaza Calls for Jihad, Prays to Become Martyr – May 8, 2013.
[5] See MEMRI reports: Special Dispatch No. 12227 – Senior IUMS Official In Article Published On Website Of Qatar-Owned Al-Jazeera: ‘Al-Aqsa Flood’ Is First Round In Plan To Eliminate Israel In 2027 – October 22, 2025; Special Dispatch No. 12205 – Conference Of Islamic Clerics In Istanbul Sponsored By Qatar And Turkey Expresses Resolute Support For Hamas, Opposition To Disarming It; Calls To Mobilize All Muslims For Jihad – October 9, 2025; Special Dispatch No. 12152, Journalists And Clerics Close To Qatar Continue To Glorify Hamas Leaders And The October 7, 2023 Attack: A Model For Raising Our Children, September 4, 2025; Special Dispatch No. 12109 – Qatar-Affiliated Journalists And Islamic Scholars Criticize Call To Disarm Hamas Issued By UN High-Level International Conference For Implementation Of Two State Solution: It Is A ‘Betrayal Of Allah,’ ‘Collaboration With The Enemy’; Rights Will Be Achieved Only By Force – August 5, 2025; Special Dispatch No. 11903, Fatwa By International Union Of Muslim Scholars (IUMS), Based In And Funded By Qatar, Declares ‘Armed Jihad’ Against Israel Obligatory For All Muslims, Calls To Urgently Form ‘Islamic Military Alliance’ Against Israel, March 31, 2025; Special Dispatch No. 10925 – Qatar-Based And Funded International Union Of Muslim Scholars (IUMS) Publishes Old Article By Senior Hamas Official Describing Takeover Of Gaza Border Region, Israeli City Of Ashkelon, In Preparation For Liberation Of Palestine And Realization Of Prophetic Promise – November 1, 2023; Inquiry & Analysis No. 1576 – As Qatar Mediates Between Israel And Hamas, It Holds Mass Rally For Hamas In Doha Supporting Armed Struggle And Jihad Against Israel – Participants Included Hamas Political Bureau Head Isma’il Haniya – May 21, 2021.
[7] Paltimeps.ps, February 3, 2012.
[8] Aljazeera.net, May 9, 2013.
[9] Palinfo.com, September 27, 2022.
[10] Paltimeps.ps, February 4, 2012.
[11] Iumsonline.org, January 9, 2024.
[12] Palinfo.com, January 9, 2024.
[13] Iumsonline.org, January 11, 2024.
[14] See MEMRI Special Dispatch No. 12180, Abd Al-Jabbar Sa’id, An Official In Hamas Terror Organization, Is A Senior Faculty Member At Qatar University, September 22, 2025. It should be noted that Sa’id is not the only Hamas official who is a lecturer at Qatar University. Baraa Nezar Rayan, the son of Hamas political bureau and military wing member Nezar Rayan who was killed in 2009, is likewise a member of the university’s Shari’a faculty. Baraa Nezar Rayan often shares posts on X praising Hamas and containing Hamas propaganda. See for example his posts from October 7, 2023 (X.com/BaraaNezarRayan).
[15] On December 13, 1992, a Hamas militant cell kidnapped Israeli Border Police officer Nissim Toledano in Lod and demanded in exchange for his release the release of Hamas founder Sheikh Ahmed Yassin from prison. Toledano was murdered by his kidnappers and his body was found two days after his kidnapping.
[16] Palscholars.org, December 8, 2022; Palinfo.com, August 26, 2007.
[17] Alahrar.ps, June 12, 2012.
[18] Iumsonline.org, October 21, 2025.
[19] Safa.ps, August 30, 2017.
[20] Facebook.com/etehadolamap, April 7, 2020; palinfo.com, January 12, 2010.
[21] Safa.ps, February 14, 2010.
[22] Aa.com.tr, May 2, 2017.
[23] Iumsonline.org, January 14, 2024.
[24] Palinfo.com, January 13, 2024.
[25] Palinfo.com, April 4, 2023.
[26] Alresalah.ps, June 5, 2022.