What has Hamas done for the people of Gaza?
JVL Introduction
It is over two years since Hamas launched its 7th October assault on Israel and it recently published its own assessment, called “Our Narrative… Al-Aqsa Flood: Two Years of Steadfastness and the Will for Liberation”, presenting the war as a “victory for resistance and steadfastness.”
Given the terrible havoc wreaked in Gaza and the horrendous callousness of Israel’s genocidal regime, it is understandable that outsiders will be cautious about ascribing any blame to Hamas.
But for veteran Ramallah-based reporter and staunch supporter of the Palestinian people, Amira Hass, accountability is essential.
As one of her informants living in Gaza put it, there is in Hamas’s assessment “disdain for the blood and suffering [of the people of Gaza]… a blatant ignoring of reality, an attempt to convince people that the biggest tragedy in the modern history of Palestine and Gaza was a ‘national necessity’ and a historic achievement.”
This informant, like others, has no problem with Hamas’s analysis of Zionism as a colonialist-settler movement, and Israel an ethnic cleanser; but sees no sign of any self-criticism, of learning anything or of taking any responsibility for the enormous price that Gazans have paid.
There are many contradictions and delusions in Hamas’s assessment which Hass alludes to. The text, for example “lies when it praises the refusal of Gazans to surrender to attempts by Israel to expel them. People simply couldn’t leave. People who could leave left the enclave and many still fantasize about leaving.”
But then, for Hass, this documents is not directed to the people of Gaza. It is, rather, a political statement attempting to build support for Hamas’s view of the struggle in the wider Muslim world, the Ummah. It provides little solace for those who have suffered in Gaza.
The reality is that “the armed struggle” has never seriously dented the ambitions of colonialist Israel…
RK
This article was originally published by Haaretz on Sat 27 Dec 2025. Read the original here.
Hamas Is proud of Its 'achievements' but hasn't convinced the Gazans who pay the price
In a self-congratulatory document that the group published to mark the two-year anniversary of its October 7 attack, Hamas doesn’t explain how the armed struggle that it says is necessary has never stopped colonialist Israel, as it defines it
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This is such a sad reflection on the arrogance of Hamas in the face of Israeli similar objuracy. It makes me, for one, want to cry with despair at the situation, in which Israel is now withdrawing yet more aid…It seems there is absolutely no path to peace, so another year of death and destruction…
Well, if I imagine that the 7 October attack hadn’t happened then I must imagine the mounting death toll in Palestinian land and the deadly grinding progress of the theft and “settlement” of what is left of Palestine until the Palestinians leave their homeland or are buried there. I don’t know if Hamas were right to do what they did but it does seem to have roused people to the corruption and undermining of their “democracies” around the world. Despite the blatant efforts of corrupt governments and media to hide what’s going on people are watching and I hope are wakening to a horrible reality.
Of course you are right the past two years have been a calamity for Palestinians in Gaza and the Occupied territories. However the other side of the coin which you fail to mention is that since October 2023 Israel has lost the support of most people in Europe and America, as well as in other countries. The world now knows that Israel is practicing genocide. The Western European leaders are having a difficult time supporting Israel while their populations don’t. After Trump the next president (Democrat) will have no choice but to stop supporting Israel. Before that day in October nobody was interested in the Palestinians, today it is on everyones lips.
Several of my friends in or from the region will agree with this. For us here there will probably be a certain ambivalence. There’s always a tension between solidarity and autonomy. Thank you JVL for giving us the materials to work this through.