Hamas’s growing jihadi terror network is a growing threat to Europe

Even as the world focuses on the murderous anti-Semitic massacre in Sydney, Hamas’s growing jihadi terror network is a growing threat to Europe, as is being exposed by a series of low-profile police raids across Europe

One still, gray morning in Berlin two and a half months ago, German security forces raided three different apartments around the capital. They apprehended two Syrian-born German citizens, and a third man who had recently arrived from Lebanon. Their searches uncovered Kalashnikov rifles, handguns, and — according to the indictment — evidence that the trio was in the advanced stage of preparations for attacks on Israeli and Jewish targets in the German capital.

The third suspect, identified as Wael P.M., had been under surveillance from the moment he stepped onto German soil. He was classified as a known and dangerous operative, and the decision to arrest the group was made once authorities concluded that the cell was transitioning from planning to execution.

The arrests, enabled by close coordination between the Mossad and German intelligence, revealed a deeply troubling picture: After decades of focusing on propaganda and fundraising in Europe, Hamas appears to be shifting gears. For the first time, the organization seems ready to carry out attacks on European soil.

A statement from the Prime Minister’s Office in Jerusalem confirmed that the arrests were only one part of a continent-wide Mossad surveillance operation targeting Hamas infrastructure. That operation has revealed covert operational cells and weapons stockpiles in multiple European countries, all of which were later dismantled by local security agencies. Austria’s interior minister acknowledged that his own services had been tracking similar activity.

The message is unmistakable: Hamas’s operations in Europe, underway for years, have morphed from a logistical and fundraising pipeline into a real operational terror threat.

Stashing Weapons

To understand how deeply Hamas has penetrated Europe, one must rewind nearly two years. In December 2023, weeks after the October 7 massacre, authorities in Germany and the Netherlands arrested four operatives born in Lebanon who had lived in Europe for many years.

Three were detained in Germany — Abdelhamim al-Ali, an Italian resident; Mohammed Bassiouny, a Berlin resident with Egyptian citizenship; and Ibrahim Elrassatmi, who had lived in Berlin since 2012. The fourth, Nazih Rustom, was picked up in Rotterdam and extradited.

Investigators were stunned by what they learned. The four had not merely been engaged in fundraising, as previously assumed. They had been maintaining hidden weapons caches across the continent. One cache discovered near Plovdiv, Bulgaria, contained Kalashnikov rifles, a silenced pistol, three additional handguns, and hundreds of magazines. Another was discovered in rural Denmark, on the island of Funen. A third, which Hamas operatives repeatedly searched for but never located, was believed to be buried in a forest in Poland near the Czech border.

The revelations shocked German intelligence services, which had long viewed Hamas’s European activity as auxiliary — propaganda and fundraising. Suddenly, it was clear that the organization has been building a fully operational terror infrastructure. More alarming still was what investigators found on a seized flash drive: photographs of Israel’s Berlin embassy, the former Tempelhof Airport compound, and the US Air Force base at Ramstein — evidence of systematic intelligence collection ahead of potential attacks.

Simultaneously, Danish authorities arrested six additional suspects, including two women and several individuals linked to Loyal to Familia, a local organized crime gang banned in 2021. Some were charged with purchasing drones intended for Hamas attacks in Denmark or elsewhere. Investigators concluded that the criminal network had provided logistical cover for Hamas, and that several members had fled to Lebanon after their organization was dismantled.

Fools’ Errand

Further to the east, the story of the lost Polish weapons cache would read like a comedy of errors — if it weren’t a terror plot.

Between June and December 2023, Hamas operatives made at least four trips to Poland, following precise instructions from handlers in Lebanon. They rented cars, stayed in small border-town hotels, and combed forests at night —returning empty-handed each time.

The first attempt came in late June. Nazih Rustom and another operative flew from Beirut to Berlin, then drove to Poland for a two-day search around the city of Jelenia Góra. They found nothing. Rustom immediately returned to Beirut to report his failure in person.

In late July, another Hamas operative flew from Finland to join Ibrahim Elrassatmi for a second search. Again, despite real-time instructions from Lebanon, they returned empty-handed.

In early October, just two days before the October 7 attacks, Rustom received new encrypted coordinates for a wooded junction near the town of Jeleniow. He and Mohammed Bassiouny searched meticulously between 1:38 and 6:33 a.m. — and again found nothing.

On October 7 itself, as Hamas attacked Israel, the two men returned to Poland for a daylight search. Again, failure.

Later that month, Abdelhamim al-Ali arrived in Berlin and — armed with digging and navigation tools supplied by Elrassatmi — launched yet another attempt. They scoured the forest and nearby villages before abandoning the mission. A final attempt in late November was abruptly cut short when Khalil al-Kharraz, the Hamas commander overseeing the European network, was killed in an Israeli strike in Lebanon.

The Man Behind the Curtain

Khalil Hamed al-Kharraz, known as Abu Khaled, was the shadowy figure guiding the entire operation. The deputy commander of Hamas’s military wing in Lebanon, he was described by defendants as the head of the organization’s “foreign operations.” He issued real-time directives, received detailed field reports, and met personally with operatives in Beirut.

Before the weapons-cache affair, little was publicly known about his covert work. His only prominent appearance came in 2016, when British citizen Faiz Sharari was arrested in Israel. Sharari, sent by al-Kharraz to deliver funds and equipment to Hamas operatives in the West Bank, revealed that al-Kharraz oversaw a wide network of Palestinian Europeans performing sensitive missions.

Israel killed al-Kharraz in November 2023. Two Turkish nationals died with him — one a former ISIS fighter in Syria, the other linked to a Turkey-based Quds Force proxy. Their presence suggested that Hamas was seeking to build an operational branch in Turkey — a suspicion later reinforced by documents seized in Gaza outlining a plan for a Turkey-based Hamas security unit tasked with overseas operations, including assassinations and maritime sabotage.

Al-Ali even flew from Germany to attend al-Kharraz’s funeral — and was photographed carrying his coffin, images that later became evidence in his indictment. After al-Kharraz’s death, his son Assad assumed his father’s role as liaison to the European network.

Rustom, arrested in Rotterdam, was no ordinary operative either. A relative by marriage of al-Kharraz, he came from a family with a long terror pedigree. Born in Rashidiya refugee camp in 1967, he arrived in the Netherlands in 1994 — but family members of his had already taken part in attacks on Israel in the early 1980s, including the failed infiltration known to Palestinians as “the Hanita Operation.”

Rustom built an ostensibly charitable career, joining boards of foundations linked to Hamas fundraiser Amin Abu Rashed, who is now on trial in the Netherlands. Rustom served as secretary and treasurer of successor organizations to the banned Al-Aqsa Foundation. In 2012, he founded his own charity, Bab al-Jana — “Gate of Paradise” — which marketed itself as a relief agency. His social media revealed links both to the Muslim Brotherhood and to pro-Gaza activist networks.

Terror Foundations

This expansive operational network did not develop overnight. It was built on top of a far older financial infrastructure.

Its roots lie in Aachen, western Germany, where until the early 2000s the Al-Aqsa Foundation — a key Hamas fundraising arm in the West — operated its central European branch. Presenting itself as a charity, it funneled money to institutions tied to Hamas’s civilian infrastructure in the territories. Germany banned the foundation in 2002; the Federal Court upheld the closure in 2004 , ruling that Hamas’s “social” and “military” arms were inseparable.

But shutting down one fund didn’t stop the flow. New organizations arose, shifting names and personnel but continuing the same work. In Germany, the German-Palestinian Community Association became known for staging what local intelligence described as “Hamas’s most important propaganda event in Europe.” In Austria, charities such as the Palestinian-Austrian Humanitarian Association transferred hundreds of thousands of euros to Hamas-linked bodies, including Hebron’s Islamic Charity and Gaza’s al-Salah Association, which German intelligence classified as “directly tied to Hamas.”

According to the US Treasury Department, the leading Hamas figure in Germany today is Majed al-Zeer, a British citizen who moved to Berlin in 2014. Formerly head of the London-based Palestinian Return Center, he now directs the European Palestinian Council for Political Affairs. Photographs show him alongside dead Hamas political chief Ismail Haniyeh. After October 7,  he described the massacre as “self-defense.” In October 2024 the US designated him a global terrorist for his central role in Hamas fundraising in Europe. He is believed to have relocated to Istanbul.

Al-Zeer’s counterpart in Austria is Adel Abdullah Doghman, also designated by the US as a terrorist and described as “one of Hamas’s most prominent representatives in Europe.” He long chaired the annual European Palestinians Conference and was photographed with senior Hamas officials, including during a 2012 Gaza visit warmly hosted by Haniyeh.

Riding Street Energy

All this activity unfolds against the backdrop of a large and well-embedded Palestinian community. Because German law forbids collecting data on ethnic origin, estimates are informal — but intelligence services believe roughly 100,000 Palestinians live in Germany, the largest such community in Europe.

Around 45,000 are concentrated in Berlin alone, and comprise half of the city’s Muslim population. Three-quarters of them arrived from Lebanon after the civil war of the late 1970s.

Germany’s domestic intelligence agency reports that Hamas supporters in the country increased by 50 percent between 2008 and 2023 — from 300 to 450. In Berlin alone, 150 supporters were identified in 2023, up 50 percent from the previous year.

The post–October 7 surge of pro-Palestinian demonstrations opened a new door. Hamas, it appears, is trying to ride the grassroots energy to build real political influence.

Austria provided the clearest example. In 2024, a new party called “the Gaza List” ran for parliament, presenting itself as a protest movement against Austria’s support for Israel. It recruited candidates from varied backgrounds — even several Jewish candidates — to broaden its base. But at its core stood familiar figures. Among its founders was Israa Doghman, daughter of Adel Doghman, alongside others connected to charities under investigation for Hamas ties. The party failed to cross the electoral threshold, but the attempt marked a new direction.

At the same time, Europe hosts an expanding media ecosystem amplifying Hamas messaging. The most prominent is Gaza Now, a platform with roughly two million followers, run from Linz, Austria, by Mustafa Ayyash, a Gaza-born Austrian citizen designated by both the US and UK as a terror supporter. Authorities shut down his WhatsApp channel (300,000 followers) and Facebook pages (eight million followers), and Austrian police raided his home and seized computers.

Ayyash’s personal story further binds him to Hamas; his father was killed in an Israeli strike in Gaza in November 2023. After Haniyeh’s assassination in Tehran in July 2024, Ayyash posted photos of his father alongside Haniyeh. In September 2025 he was arrested at the airport in Amsterdam due to Hamas involvement; the Dutch have requested his extradition to Austria.

The European Response

Clearly, European complacency about the activities of its large Palestinian population has been shattered. The October 7 attacks changed the equation. Countries that had tolerated Hamas activity for years shifted abruptly.

Germany led the charge. In early November 2023, Interior Minister Nancy Faeser formally designated Hamas a terrorist organization and ordered the closure of affiliated groups.

Then-chancellor Olaf Scholz declared: “Anyone supporting terrorist organizations like Hamas commits a criminal offense.” Authorities banned the display of Hamas symbols, the wearing of al-Qassam headbands, and even the slogan “From the river to the sea.” Police raided 15 Hamas-linked sites, and many organizations voluntarily dissolved out of fear of prosecution.

By contrast, Austria’s earlier attempt to rein in Hamas activity ended in failure. “Operation Luxor,” launched in late 2020 with 900 officers raiding dozens of sites across four regions, collapsed when courts ruled the raids unlawful and all cases were dropped for lack of evidence. The result: Most activists walked free, and not a single conviction followed.

The disparity underscores a structural challenge: Hamas operates in Europe through a web of charities and community initiatives, making it extraordinarily difficult for legal authorities to tie its figures to terrorism. Parliamentary queries in Austria about Hamas activity elicited evasive replies: “No information available,” or “classified.”

Austrian security reports warn that since October 7 there has been a sharp rise in “Islamically motivated” anti-Semitic incidents. Between October and December 2023 alone, 22 such events were recorded. Pro-Palestinian demonstrations became venues for anti-Semitic rhetoric; preachers disseminated hatred; authorities even identified isolated attempts by individuals to travel to Gaza to join Hamas.

In their 2024 annual report, Austrian agencies noted that regarding the weapons-cache network, “it remains unclear whether the weaponry was intended for attacks on Jewish institutions.” But the October 2025 arrests — and the uncovering of operational depots — point clearly toward Hamas’s intent to carry out attacks against Jews and Israelis in Europe, a mode of operation the movement had avoided until now.

Hamas, for its part, denied any connection to the arrested men in Germany. In a statement, it dismissed the affair as an effort to damage the movement and undermine “sympathy” for Palestinians and their “legitimate struggle against the Zionist occupation.” Hamas insisted its policy “was and remains to limit resistance to Palestine alone.”

But the infrastructure tells a different story. Operatives, money, weapons, and logistics — everything was in place.

The only question is whether European security services, working alongside the Mossad, can stay one step ahead of whatever comes next.

(Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 1092)