Hamas and Israel are again negotiating a prisoner exchange and cease-fire.
Once again, the stumbling block seems to be the conflicting demands of Israel and Hamas: Hamas’ condition for the release of the hostages is a permanent ceasefire, to which Israel does not seem to agree until Hamas’s military capability is destroyed.
The Gaza Strip is in ruins after the Israeli ground attack. According to the Gaza Ministry of Health, more than 37,000 Palestinians have died. The people of Gaza are suffering from famine.
What did Hamas achieve with its war-triggering attack on October 7, and what vision does it have for post-war Gaza?
The independence of Palestine came into the spotlight
The main goal of Hamas is “liberating Palestine and challenging the Zionist project”.
However, one can only make educated guesses about the aims of the extremist organization’s October attack, says the University of Helsinki’s professor of Middle Eastern studies Hannu Juusola and a senior researcher at the Institute of Foreign Policy Timo R. Stewart.
From Hamas’ perspective, its attack on Israel was a success. It managed to get the hostages it used as bargaining chips, showed its strength to Israel and presented itself as a freedom fighter in the eyes of the Palestinians.
Israel’s ground attack froze Israel’s rapprochement with Arab countries, especially Saudi Arabia. In addition, with the help of hostages, Hamas has freed 240 Palestinians from Israeli prisons – although this is not a particularly significant number, Juusola points out.
– The biggest single success for Hamas was that the issue of Palestinian independence has once again risen to the agenda of world politics, says Juusola.
Instead, Hamas did not create a wider regional conflict. In that case, Israel would have been involved in a multi-front war, especially with Hezbollah operating in Lebanon and Iran.
Now, with the help of the last hostages, Hamas is trying to get Israel to withdraw from the Gaza Strip.
One example of the suffering of Gazan civilians was Israel’s operation on the Nuseirat refugee camp on Saturday:
Disagreements in the leadership of Hamas
Hamas’s long-term goals are an even bigger mystery than its short-term goals, researchers say.
A major reconstruction awaits Gaza. Israel and the United States also do not accept the Hamas-led regime in Gaza.
Before the war, Hamas had given signs that it would moderate due to its administrative responsibility. It refrained from rocket attacks and obtained Israeli work permits for Palestinians in Gaza.
According to Stewart, the Hamas attack showed that Hamas does not agree to concessions on Israel’s terms.
– With their attack, they aim to break the current situation and replace it with something better. Exactly what that would be is a difficult question, says Stewart.
The top management of Hamas operates from abroad. It appears to be at odds with Hamas’s Gazan leadership over goals.
According to Juusola, the primary goal of the foreign leadership is for Hamas to remain an important political actor.
– It seems to be more ready for compromises, says Juusola.
The external leadership of Hamas has hinted at the possibility that it would be inclined to accept the two-state model under certain conditions, in which an independent Palestinian state with its capital in Jerusalem would be established alongside Israel in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
During the Gaza war, Hamas has also restarted negotiations with its rival Fatah over the future of the Palestinian territories. Hamas’s top leader Ismail Haniyya even talked in December about establishing a new Palestinian coalition government in Gaza.
Moderate, President Mahmud Abbas led by the Fatah party leads the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank. Hamas and Fatah drifted into armed conflict with each other after Hamas won the Palestinian parliamentary elections in 2006. As a result, Hamas seized power in Gaza.
News agency Reuters representatives of the parties are scheduled to meet next time in China in mid-June.
According to Reuters’ Hamas sources, the extremist organization is aware that it cannot be part of the internationally recognized Palestinian Authority, and it seeks to remain a political actor by other means.
The Hamas leadership in Gaza, on the other hand, can still think that they will win the war and keep Gaza under their control. However, Juusola emphasizes that there is little reliable information about Hamas’ mutual disagreements.
American magazine The Foreign Affairs writes that Hamas may even try to wash its hands of the responsibility of governing Gaza.
It is possible that it is trying to implement a similar model that the extremist organization Hezbollah operates in Lebanon: while Hezbollah is an influential political party in the country’s administration, its own armed forces, separate from the Lebanese army, fight against Israel.
In this model, Hamas would remain a major political actor while its armed wing would be able to continue its terrorist activities without accountability to Gaza’s civilians.
– The conditions in Gaza were desperate even before the war. Administering the area blockaded by Israel has not been an ideal situation for Hamas, says Timo R. Stewart.
Palestinians see the attack in a different light
While Hamas is fighting Israel, it is competing for favor with the Palestinians with Fatah.
A large part, more than 70 percent of Palestinians have supported Hamas’s attack on Israel.
Information appears appreciated From the poll of the PCPSR research institutewhich was last made half a year after the outbreak of the war.
– The situation in Gaza was not good in any way even before the war: there were no jobs, hope or a way out elsewhere. Israel considered the situation just above a humanitarian crisis. The war can be seen as part of a decades-long struggle that will inevitably involve suffering, says Stewart.
Stewart points out that there are also many people in Gaza who have never supported Hamas, and who may now blame Hamas for the deaths of their loved ones.
According to Stewart, the Palestinians do not see the attack in the light of the same information as the Israelis and Finns.
Although the details of the atrocities committed by Hamas are still unclear, videos, eyewitness statements and various reports show that Hamas is to be suspected of war crimes.
However, the majority of Palestinians say that they have not seen such videos of the atrocities committed by Hamas against Israelis.
– Palestinians have seen many times how the Israeli authorities and the media present things quite differently from what they themselves have experienced. Because of this, even those who have seen the videos do not necessarily trust their authenticity, says Stewart.
Hamas’s popularity rose momentarily after the events of October 7, which Stewart says is typical in conflict situations.
Support has since decreased significantly during the current year. Currently, about 30 percent of Palestinians support Hamas.
According to the PCPSR report, Hamas was the most popular choice among Palestinians for the post-war Gaza leader in March.
According to Stewart, when interpreting the political opinions of the Palestinians, it must be taken into account that the Palestinians are living in a situation where it has been almost 20 years since the last election.
– The Palestinians do not live in a free society where they are used to free election campaigning or information transmission, says Stewart.
The basis of Hamas’s popularity is not so much the Islamic politics it pursues, but the Palestinians’ tiredness of the corrupt Fatah, which, despite the concessions it gave to Israel, has not succeeded in getting the Palestinians the right to self-determination.
Stewart emphasizes that different countries have not wanted to give support to Hamas by recognizing Palestine.
– Hamas’s message is that the only option is armed resistance. It is important to support other Palestinian parties who are committed to promoting the two-state model peacefully, says Stewart.