By Taghreed Saadeh
Since the internal Palestinian split in 2007, Hamas has caused serious and far-reaching damage to the Palestinian cause. It can be said that this division has been one of the main reasons behind the national Palestinian decline. Despite this, the movement continues to follow the same approach that led to this damage, and today once again raises the slogan of “unity” at a critical national moment, while Hamas itself that carried out the military coup that separated Gaza from the West Bank, dividing geography, people, and institutions for nearly two decades.
Hamas marginalized national cadres, imprisoned and persecuted its opponents, and treated the Gaza Strip as the private property of the organization rather than a shared national space. It ruled the population through repression and force, imposing a rigid security grip under the banner of “resistance,” while simultaneously engaging in direct interventions in Arab affairs, far removed from the core of the Palestinian cause.
In Syria, Hamas participated militarily alongside extremist groups such as Jabhat al-Nusra and ISIS. Reports have spoken of direct relationships between Hamas leaders and prominent figures in these organizations, including al-Julani, in addition to interventions in Jordan and attempts to interfere in the Egyptian political landscape. During the period of Mohamed Morsi’s rule, Hamas rearranged its regional alliances and effectively distanced itself from the discourse of resistance, further confirming its political pragmatism and abandonment of its declared principles.
It has not been difficult for any observer to conclude that Hamas has used “resistance” as a tool to secure political and organizational gains, rather than as a genuine project for liberating land. This is particularly evident given that its project is transnational in nature, tied to the agenda of the Muslim Brotherhood, rather than to the Palestinian national project.
Hamas is fully aware that it functions, in practice, as an obstacle to the establishment of a Palestinian state, an outcome that objectively aligns with the agenda of Benjamin Netanyahu. Although the movement has recently attempted to soften its rhetoric toward the Palestinian statehood project at the United Nations, after having long denounced it as betrayal, this shift came only after the failure of October 7 and the defeat suffered by the movement, not as a result of a genuine national reassessment.
By contrast, the Palestinian national project achieved significant political milestones, most notably in 2012, when President Mahmoud Abbas led Palestine’s successful bid to obtain non-member observer state status at the United Nations, completing the path initiated with the Declaration of Independence in 1988. This project, however, was subjected for years to systematic delegitimization and accusations of treason by Hamas and its media outlets, in an effort to weaken it while portraying the movement as the “sole legitimate resistance force.”
Today, Hamas shamelessly claims that it was responsible for persuading some states to support recognition of the State of Palestine, despite the fact that prior to October 7, 2023, approximately 140 countries had already recognized Palestine. Additional recognitions came through a joint French-Saudi initiative, supported by the Arab League and the European Union, both of which have explicitly conditioned progress on Hamas’s removal from the Palestinian political scene.
During the most recent war, Hamas disregarded its moral responsibility toward the Palestinian people, treating civilian deaths as a “natural price” for its operations, with no sense of accountability or national responsibility. Testimonies from Gaza residents indicate that the movement focused on supporting its own members exclusively, as if it bore no responsibility for the catastrophe it had caused.
Despite possessing vast financial resources collected in the name of the Palestinian cause and the people of Gaza, these funds were not directed toward alleviating civilian suffering. Instead, a significant portion was allocated to Hamas operatives. Investigative reports revealed that during the war, the movement ensured direct financial payments to its members, while ignoring the humanitarian disaster it had created, including hundreds of civilians who suffered from famine and died as a result.
Hamas has fractured Palestinian society, squandered decades of national struggle, and continues to maneuver solely for its own organizational survival rather than for the Palestinian cause. What remains of the movement today is little more than a handful of leaders living abroad, in Turkey and Qatar, without any genuine political or military presence in Gaza.
The Palestinian national aspiration lies in ending the dominance of the Muslim Brotherhood over the Gaza Strip and opening the path toward an inclusive national project that restores dignity to the Palestinian cause, away from the exploitation of slogans and the service of occupation-aligned agendas, regardless of how loudly “resistance” is proclaimed.
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