Hamas: a reality check.

Whatever your views regarding the war in Gaza, it's important to be aware of sectarian romanticisation - that is the practice where individuals or groups propagandise and idealise factions in conflicts for the purpose of increasing international support or sympathy. When victory in conflict is a categorical must all manner of disinformation, omission and mythologisation become first permissible as a means to an end and subsequently believed as truisms by later generations. A prime example of this is the Islamist ruling power of Gaza, Hamas, where they are cast as an ordinary freedom fighting resistance militia in the belief that such support is necessary to ensure freedom for Palestinians, regardless of the reality.

In a nutshell (detail and sources below)

Hamas govern Gaza as a fascist dictatorship, torturing and murdering dissidents and ruling through fear.
Hamas is implicated in numerous war crimes and devastating attacks on civilians, including women, children and the elderly, over the last 30 years.
Hamas is not a secular resistance force, but a religious–nationalist jihadi offshoot of the Muslim Brotherhood, founded with the express purpose of establishing an 'Islamic state' (sound familiar?) in all of Palestine.
Hamas' operating ideology is that of an apocalyptic death cult, ideating suicide bombing attacks ("death for the sake of Allah is the loftiest of its wishes").
Hamas' founding charter is expressly genocidal and steeped in the 'Protocols of the Elders of Zion' hoax, a dehumanising conspiracy that became mandatory reading in parts of Nazi Germany.
Hamas is not a mere local resistance force, but a militia armed and funded by Iran, and must be seen as a broader part of Iran's foreign policy goals, rather than through a simple occupier/occupied framework.
Hamas' 2017 policy document which moderated some language never actually repudiated its founding charter, was totally belied by subsequent militant activity, and many analysts regard it as a deception.

In Detail

Authoritarian rule

Hamas don't bring liberty to Gaza but rather repression; in 2015 Amnesty International reported on Hamas carrying out a "brutal campaign of abductions, torture and unlawful killings".¹ In 2018 Human Rights Watch reported that "Hamas authorities in Gaza routinely arrest and torture peaceful critics and opponents."² The Telegrpah reported in 2025 on how Hamas use torture to silence protest, including one protester having "his feet were deliberately broken with large stones and iron crowbars" and "also shot in the legs."³ After an initial short lived elected unity government with Fatah, Hamas seized power over the Gaza Strip in 2007 and have not held elections since, ruling as a one party state and detaining lawmakers from other parties.⁴ In summary, brutal authoritarian rule has suppressed political and social liberty for the citizens of Gaza, hence Hamas cannot be viewed as liberators and cannot be considered representative of the people of Gaza.

Religious fanaticism, Nazi propaganda and anti-Semitism

Hamas originated as a Islamic jihad movement that arose in the late eighties in the Gaza strip, as a branch of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt that sought to escalate violence against Israeli occupation. Hamas were in opposition not just to Israel's existence, but also to the more secular PLO - the ruling coalition of Palestine of the time. Hamas sought to rid the region of elements it considered 'un-Islamic', this included 'apostate' Muslim groups in addition to Jews.⁵ In its 1998 founding charter, Hamas made their pledge to exterminate Jews from the levant abundantly clear: "The time will not come until Muslims will fight the Jews (and kill them); until the Jews hide behind rocks and trees, which will cry: 0 Muslim! there is a Jew hiding behind me, come on and kill him!". Their founding philosophy is a derivation of the 20th century hoax document 'The Protocols of Elders of Zion', e.g.

"With their money they formed secret organizations - such as the Freemasons, Rotary Clubs and the Lions - which are spreading around the world, in order to destroy societies and carry out Zionist interests... They stood behind World War I ... and formed the League of Nations through which they could rule the world. They were behind World War II, through which they made huge financial gains... There is no war going on anywhere without them having their finger in it."⁶

This fictional conspiracy theory gained rapid notoriety when Nazi Germany proliferated and made it mandatory reading in classrooms. In other words the founding animating ideology has its foundations in nazi propaganda.⁷ This is not surprising, as much has been written on the link between Nazi foreign policy/propaganda and the rapid rise of anti-Semitism in the middle east during the early 20th century⁸, of which Hamas would be an eventual outgrowth.

Violence and terror, the rise of a death cult

It sounds cliche to say at this point but Hamas literally are a 'terrorist organization' in the most quintessential and straightforward usage of the term: perpetrating hundreds of suicide bombing attacks targeting civilians from the moment they were formed.⁹ It is thought this was in response to Jewish settler terrorist attacks such as the massacre of 29 Palestinians in Hebron by Baruch Goldstein. Meir Litvak however points out that Hamas' use and religious justification of suicide attacks predated this, and identifies Hamas' "doctrinal justifications glorify martyrdom as the most noble manifestation of jihad and Islamic belief."¹⁰ Litvak chronicles how Hamas became essentially a 'cult of death' and that their mystical beliefs on the 'benefits and pleasures that await future martyrs' helped to "overcome basic human instincts that are opposed to the cult of death and helps to rationalize the high Palestinian casualties incurred in the conflict with Israel, presenting them as a positive achievement, instead of as a source of pain."

Overtly genocidal

Litvak goes on to describe how Hamas clerics and writers are explicit in their open desire to exterminate the Jews:

"Salah al-Khalidi writes that, following the complete liberation of Palestine, the Jews will first return to the status of a dispersed, humiliated minority among the nations, and, in a second phase, all the Jews of the world will be exterminated and “humanity will be relieved of their presence, since subsequently, not one Jew will remain alive.” Writing in Hamas organ al-Risala, Kan‘an ‘Ubayd states that suicide operations are necessary so that “people will know that the extermination of Jews is good for the inhabitants of the worlds,” while the Hamas children’s organ, al-Fatih, urges children to ask God to “annihilate the Jews, the oppressors, the usurpers.” The calls for the elimination of the Jews stem from the position that the Jews had lost their right to life as a protected minority, since they defied Muslim superiority by establishing the state of Israel, and is shared by numerous clerics and Islamist preachers all over the Middle East."¹⁰

Oct 7th

There has been an odd attempt to revise or reframe what happened on Oct 7th by some actors, there are two approaches which paint two opposite narratives: One narrative claims it was just an unremarkable military operation carried out by resistance forces targeting military bases, with possibly some acceptance that there were instances of tragic collateral damage in the process. The other is that it was simply the acts of desperately oppressed escapees of an 'Auschwitz' like prison camp, and any atrocities committed are just predictable acts of desperation from a traumatized and tortured peoples towards the 'prison camp' guards/

It's very important to stress that both of these points are entirely false. To be clear on the facts: Oct 7th was an act of sustained and repeated atrocities, largely against unarmed non combatants (aka civilians), "including women, children, older people and those with foreign nationalities"¹³ As described by Human Rights Watch

"Palestinian fighters fired directly at civilians, often at close range, as they tried to flee, and at people driving through the area. The attackers hurled grenades, shot into shelters, and fired rocket-propelled grenades at homes. They set houses on fire, burning and choking people, and forcing out others whom they shot or captured. They took dozens hostage and summarily killed others ... attacks targeting civilians and civilian objects; willful killing of people in custody; cruel and other inhumane treatment; crimes involving sexual and gender-based violence; hostage-taking; mutilation and despoiling bodies; use of human shields; and pillage and looting. The widespread attack was directed against a civilian population. Killing civilians and taking hostages were central aims of the planned attack, not an afterthought, a plan gone awry, or isolated acts. Human Rights Watch concluded that the planned murder of civilians and the hostage-taking were crimes against humanity."¹¹
"Palestinian fighters repeatedly attacked civilians and summarily executed individuals in their custody. The killings of civilians appear planned because of the many similarities in how killings took place across the attack sites: the armed groups directed many of their attacks at residential areas, fighters began to shoot civilians immediately after the assault began at 6:30 a.m., and the armed groups’ audio recordings and videos of the assault posted on their Telegram channels were indicative of a modus operandi. Palestinian fighters, according to witness accounts and verified videos, tortured or otherwise cruelly treated people in their custody."¹²

Likewise, a UN report gave detailed accounts of various massacres and war crimes that occurred, such as the attack on kibbutz Be’eri

"Once attackers entered the kibbutz, they proceeded to shoot at residents, cars, pets and houses. From 08:30 onwards, they systematically moved from house to house entering by force, killing and injuring many residents and abducting others to Gaza. Since most of the residents had been hiding in safe-rooms, attackers blasted and shot at doors and used hand-grenades and other means to set houses on fire, all in an attempt to force people to leave their safe rooms
The victims of the attack on Be’eri included at least 42 women, 10 children and 45 older persons (aged over 65).27 The youngest victim was Mila Cohen a 9-month-old baby, while the oldest victim was 88-year-old Hana Kritzman. Sixteen families lost two or more family members as a result of the attack ... The Commission assesses that at approximately 12:50 militants broke into the safe room, shot and killed baby Mila Cohen, who was held in her mother’s arms, and shot and killed Ohad Cohen"¹³

Or the attack on kibbutz Nir Oz

"militants were walking around and driving motorbikes inside the kibbutz, and later in the morning they started breaking into houses, shooting at families in hiding and abducting them .... Militants also killed 79-year-old Carmela Dan along with her 12-year-old granddaughter, Noya Dan, a girl on the autistic spectrum, who was visiting during that weekend .... Several members of another family from Nir Oz were killed or abducted during the 7 October attack, including Carmela and Noya Dan (see para 54 of this report). Another member of the same family, who was 52 years old at the time, was abducted to Gaza with his two children, aged 16 and 11 years old respectively. "¹³

Or the Nova music festival

"The main festival site was under the full control of Palestinian militants for up to four hours, from around 08:30 until around 12:30. During this period, members of Hamas military wing, other Palestinian armed groups and Palestinians dressed in civilian clothes actively searched for people who were hiding and killed them when found ... The majority of festival-goers who decided to stay and hide at the main festival site were killed during this period .... One survivor, who was hiding in a white shipping container in the main festival area, reported seeing out of the window militants opening fridge doors at the bar and shooting at those who were hiding inside, and then shooting at the space under the stage. He said “I heard them executing people there."¹³

Hopefully at this point the picture becomes clear: this was by no means a normal act of military or even guerilla warfare, nor an unplanned spontaneous act by ordinary Palestinian citizens lashing out their oppressors. The plan was always a heinous attack designed to, as Time magazine wrote the next day, "Sabotage Arab-Israeli Peace Prospects"¹⁴. It was not a straightforward act of 'resistance', for it achieved the opposite effect by design, horrific and devastating reprisals on Gaza from Israel. In keeping with the martyrdom theology, the idea was to provoke an 'overwhelming' response from Israel that could (and nearly did) destroy Gaza. By foolishly and cruelly responding the way Israel did, wreaking havoc, mass death and untold misery on Gaza through its bombing campaign and receiving international condemnation, the ghoulish aims of oct 7th succeeded in a hollow sense - the residents of Gaza being an afterthought of course.