Alan Johnston, freed by Hamas on Wednesday, was the 15th foreign journalist to be abducted in Gaza since 2004 and the longest held.  Most of the others were released after some hours or, at most, a week.
 
Johnston, like the others, was seized by a clan with an agenda.  Most simply wanted jobs for unemployed fighters or to free jailed members but the Dughmush clan, which snatched Johnston, had major political and, perhaps, financial demands. 

Operating under the name Jaish Islami, the clan called upon Britain to release Abu Qatada, a firebrand Muslim preacher jailed for incitement to violence. It is also reported that the clan demanded $5 million to free Johnston.  
The Dughmush, led by Mumtaz, were a poor clan with some 5,000 members, which ran a transport business, starting out with donkey carts. It then branched out into smuggling of cigarettes and drugs from Egypt. During the second Intifada, the Palestinian rising in September 2000, the Dughmush, which were allied at first to Fateh and later to the Popular Resistance Committees began smuggling weapons.

The Dughmush pulled out of the PRC in August 2006 after clansmen kidnapped two journalists from the US Fox News network. The clan, reportedly, demanded and received a ransom of $450,000-$1.2 million for their release. This alienated Hamas which had formed the government in March 2006.  One of Hamas' main aims was to curb the power of the clans and dismantle their armed gangs. Fighting erupted when Hamas attempted to assert its authority in the Dughmash-dominated Sabra district of Gaza City.