Editor’s Note: The following column is based on the author’s detailed analysis originally published in CIC Sentinel, a monthly publication of the Combating Terrorism Center at West Point. It has been adapted for this format to highlight key insights into Hamas’ strategic calculations and the evolving dynamics of the Gaza conflict.
Looking at the current moment through Hamas’ own eyes reveals a strategic dilemma far more complex and dangerous than many outside observers assume. More than three months after the ceasefire that halted Israel’s devastating assault on Gaza, Hamas is not celebrating peace but calculating survival. The ceasefire, prisoner exchanges, and partial Israeli withdrawal have been portrayed by Hamas leaders as proof of resilience and victory, yet beneath that rhetoric lies an organisation badly weakened militarily, politically exposed, and facing existential choices. The next phase of the Gaza peace plan, involving international forces, demobilisation, and full Israeli withdrawal, is not simply a technical challenge for Hamas. It strikes at the movement’s identity, legitimacy, and future role in Palestinian politics.
Hamas understands that the cessation of hostilities does not mean the end of conflict. Israel is preparing for renewed fighting, reassessing its failures and recalibrating its strategy, while Hamas commanders are also reviewing lessons from what they call the Battle of al-Aqsa Flood. Hamas survived Israel’s overwhelming firepower, but at extraordinary cost. Its forces were degraded, its command structure disrupted, and its fighters pushed into smaller-scale guerrilla operations sustained by tunnels and urban terrain. Estimates of its remaining strength vary widely, but even the most generous figures point to a movement that has lost a significant proportion of its original fighting force and relies increasingly on new recruits motivated by anger, revenge, and desperation rather than long-term discipline.
Yet numbers alone do not tell the story Hamas tells itself. Hamas fought in a way that protected its fighters at the expense of Gaza’s civilians, framing mass civilian death as martyrdom and genocide, a narrative that gained international traction and hardened support among parts of the Palestinian population. At the same time, resentment is growing in Gaza among those who blame Hamas for provoking catastrophe. This internal contradiction weighs heavily on Hamas’ leadership. Remaining combative has preserved its dominance, but inaction or accommodation risks eroding loyalty, encouraging defections, and allowing more extreme factions to outflank it.
Unlike national armies, Hamas does not fully control its fighters. Ideological fervour, decentralised networks, and overlapping allegiances mean that individual commanders or cells can initiate violence without central approval. Continued Israeli settlement expansion and escalating violence against Palestinians, particularly in the West Bank, intensify pressure on Hamas to respond. Failure to do so risks being seen as betrayal, even complicity. Hamas also fears losing ground to Fatah and other rivals, especially as public sentiment turns against what some perceive as Hamas’ transformation from resistance movement to negotiating actor seeking a seat at the post-war table.
One possible path is confrontation. Hamas retains the ability to escalate, whether by encouraging a new intifada, conducting guerrilla attacks, or launching terrorist operations in Israel or abroad. Although its capacity for large-scale assaults like 7 October has been severely curtailed, smaller, spectacular attacks remain possible. International terrorism, historically not Hamas’ preferred tactic, has increasingly entered its strategic calculus. Evidence suggests Hamas has quietly expanded its overseas networks, even if it currently restrains them to avoid collapsing the ceasefire. If Israel resumes an all-out assault, Hamas would likely abandon restraint, using both direct and proxy violence, possibly under new banners to preserve plausible deniability, much as earlier Palestinian factions did in the past.
At the same time, Hamas understands the risks of escalation. Terrorist attacks abroad could unify Israeli society, trigger renewed war, and erode international sympathy for Palestinians. Miscalculation looms large. Hamas misjudged Israel’s response in October 2023; it knows it could do so again. Violence is difficult to calibrate, and both sides face internal hardliners eager to provoke escalation.
A second, far less likely but not impossible option would involve a dramatic shift towards a long-term suspension of armed struggle. Hamas has precedents it can invoke: Sheikh Ahmed Yassin’s proposals for extended ceasefires and the broader Islamist tradition of pragmatism under pressure. Recent signals, such as Hamas’ announcement that it is prepared to hand over civil authority in Gaza to a technocratic administration, hint at tactical flexibility. In theory, Hamas could frame such a move as a continuation of resistance by other means, justified by international recognition of Palestinian aspirations and the promise of reconstruction and statehood.
Such a turn would require extraordinary internal discipline and credibility. It would need to come from respected battlefield commanders rather than political figures, and even then it would likely provoke internal violence. Ending wars, as history shows, can be bloodier than fighting them. Hamas would also seek guarantees: Israeli withdrawal, international protection, reconstruction, and a continued role in policing and politics. It would argue that disarmament without political inclusion equals extinction. Reverting to its origins as a social, political, and religious movement rooted in Muslim Brotherhood traditions would demand abandoning the identity Hamas has cultivated as an armed vanguard of resistance, a transformation many within the movement would resist.
Between confrontation and accommodation lies a third strategy: flexibility and opportunism. This approach accepts uncertainty as the defining feature of the moment. Hamas can publicly support the ceasefire and economic development while quietly preserving its core capabilities. It can pledge not to attack Israel, cooperate selectively with an International Stabilisation Force, and rely on American pressure to restrain Israeli actions, all without surrendering its claim to armed resistance in principle. This path allows Hamas to avoid provoking renewed war while maintaining leverage. If it is excluded from the political future of Gaza, it retains the ability to wreck the process.
Under this strategy, Hamas could tacitly coexist with international forces, avoiding direct confrontation while continuing to control neighbourhoods and local security. It could hand over heavier weapons while retaining personal arms, arguing these are necessary to police Gaza’s rough and heavily armed environment. Hamas knows international forces will be reluctant to act as Israel’s proxies or shoot Palestinians, and it can exploit that reluctance to preserve de facto authority. Cooperation would be informal, pragmatic, and fragile, vulnerable to spoilers on all sides.
Hamas also understands that its network of regional allies proved unreliable. Hezbollah and Iran offered far less support than anticipated, exposing the limits of the so-called axis of resistance. While Hamas still seeks Iranian funding and weapons, it knows it cannot base its survival strategy on external salvation. Instead, it must leverage what it sees as diplomatic gains: heightened global sympathy for Palestinians and growing criticism of Israel. Maintaining that narrative requires avoiding actions that could reverse it.
Internally, Hamas remains divided. Pragmatists argue for political accommodation; hardliners insist on continued confrontation. Leadership contests reflect these tensions, and financial pressures may further destabilise cohesion. Hamas’ overriding concern is not peace but survival. It will not fully disarm, will not accept exclusion from Gaza’s future, and will not abandon its commitment to Palestinian statehood, however defined.
From Hamas’ perspective, the peace plan is both threat and opportunity. Compliance risks erasure; rejection risks annihilation. The movement does not view itself as defeated. It knows it can be crushed militarily but believes it cannot be eliminated politically or ideologically. That belief shapes every calculation. If Hamas is not allowed to play, it is prepared to overturn the board. In that sense, Hamas holds the power to make or break the peace process, even as it remains trapped by the consequences of its own choices.
Understanding this mindset does not excuse Hamas’ actions or minimise its atrocities. It clarifies why the movement continues to act as it does. Hamas thinks strategically, identifies red lines, and adapts under pressure. Its history is one of transformation, and that process is ongoing. A peaceful path exists, but peace itself is not Hamas’ objective. Survival is.
