Dr Mousa Abu Marzook is one of the founders of Hamas. The first head of its political bureau and subsequent deputy director, he is a senior member of its leadership and current director of international affairs. Born in Gaza to parents who were driven from their home in Yibna in 1948, Dr Marzook obtained his PhD in engineering in the United States where he lived and worked for many years. After Israel failed to obtain his extradition in the mid-1990s for charges arising from the First Intifada, he returned to the Middle East.