A fractured movement, an absent leadership

The two-year Israeli war on Gaza has devastated most cities in the strip, killed tens of thousands of residents and eliminated much of Hamas's political and military leadership. It now seems clear that Hamas failed to anticipate that the 7 October 2023 attack would lead to its own near-destruction, nor did it grasp the extent of Israel's intentions for Gaza—from reoccupation to the displacement of its population. 

Today, the residents of Gaza City, in the heart of the strip, find themselves alone. Israel has decided to raze the city completely, just as happened earlier in Rafah. The city's population has once again been displaced to the south. Most had only recently returned, having previously fled intense Israeli bombardment.

A leaderless movement

Throughout this cycle of displacement and return, no national rescue plan has been put forward, nor has any Hamas leader delivered a unifying message to the people of Gaza. Instead, an absence of leadership has emerged as one of the defining features of this war. 

This absence is due not only to assassinations and bombardment, but also to a lack of a coherent political vision and the deep polarisation between Fatah and Hamas, rooted in their longstanding rivalry since Hamas's takeover of Gaza in 2007. Not once have these factions come together, even in the face of the mass bloodshed of their own people.

On the ground, the reality is unmistakable: the Israeli military is demolishing Gaza City's landmark towers—such as Mushtaha and al-Ruya—one by one, like dominoes. At the same time, the government media office in Gaza is urging residents to stay put, reflecting Hamas's determination to sustain the fight with its remaining forces and media channels.

However, the movement is losing the support of the people of Gaza. Its leaders abroad have repeatedly issued ill-considered statements that provoke anger. The most recent came on 27 August from Taher al-Nunu, media advisor to the head of Hamas's political bureau. During an interview, RT Arabic presenter Mona Salman pressed him on his assessment of the decision to launch the 7 October attack.

Al-Nunu responded: "It is not possible to evaluate October 7 while the battle is still ongoing. Let me give an example from history—World War II. How did it begin, and how did it end? Before the Normandy landings, Germany had occupied nearly all of Europe. But after the landings, the situation changed completely. Any assessment made before Normandy would certainly differ from one made afterward!"

The comparison sparked a wave of anger and mockery among Gazans on social media. On Facebook, Tayseer Abdullah wrote: "The repeated, misleading comparisons made by Hamas leaders—likening the October 7 attack to the Algerian Revolution, the Vietnamese Revolution, the Egyptian October 6 War, and now the Normandy landings—reflect a state of cognitive and intellectual confusion about what actually happened."

"We feel like we're just numbers"

Even Khalil al-Hayya, one of Hamas's senior leaders, whom Israel attempted to assassinate in its bombing of Doha on 9 September, has provoked the anger of Gazans. In June, he declared: "Gaza offered itself as a sacrifice and a ransom for this nation." His words echoed an earlier statement by fellow leader Khaled Mashal, who claimed: "Our losses are tactical, while our enemy's losses are strategic." 

To many, such remarks seemed to trivialise the suffering in Gaza—more than 62,000 people killed, hundreds of thousands of homes, universities and schools destroyed, and life itself dismantled under Israel's military onslaught.

Abu Sami*, a 55-year-old resident of Nuseirat camp, summed up the situation in remarks to Qantara: "We feel like we are just numbers. No one lives through the details of this genocide with us—the pain of a mother who lost her son, the longing for the homes that were destroyed."

Given the heavy price paid by Gaza, silence about Hamas's adventures is no longer possible. Over its 19 years in power, the movement has fought five wars with Israel, each leaving its mark on the strip. The current war has brought Gaza to the brink of total destruction. 

In March 2025, hundreds of Gazans took to the streets, demanding an immediate end to the war and Hamas's resignation from power. For the first time since the group seized control of the strip in 2007, chants of "Hamas out!" rang out. 

Bassem Naim, another senior Hamas politician, responded at the time on Facebook: "Everyone has the right to cry out in pain, but it is unacceptable to exploit these tragic humanitarian conditions to promote questionable political agendas or to absolve the criminal aggressor—the occupation and its army—of responsibility."

But public anger goes beyond "cries of pain", even among religious young people, a group which the movement counts as a strategic investment for the future of the struggle. The youth have not hidden their shock at the movement and its leaders' behaviour toward the people of Gaza.

Mahmoud Mustafa, from the Sheikh Radwan neighborhood in northern Gaza, told Qantara: "These statements have wounded our spirit, as if our lives are worthless. Even the steadfast families in the north have received no words of gratitude; instead, they have been treated merely as sacrifices."

"Hamas has lost a lot"

There are no recent polls measuring Hamas's popularity nearly two years after the war, but a survey conducted by the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research in September last year showed a decline in support for the movement compared to the start of the war. 57 percent of respondents in Gaza said the decision to launch the 7 October attack was wrong, while 39 percent viewed it as the right decision. 

Former Hamas politician Ahmed Yousef told Qantara that this reflects Hamas's loss—and ongoing erosion—of support in Gaza: "Hamas has lost a great deal—if not everything—since the October 7 decision, which even took its own popular base by surprise… We have all paid the price for a reckless decision."

Yousef was in South Africa at the time of the attack before returning to Gaza, where he now lives in a tent with his wife in Khan Younis. He told Qantara that the movement's leaders "are living in a delusion and do not understand the suffering of the people on the ground. They are trying to convince their audience that the resistance is fine and unaffected, while the reality is entirely different." 

"Gaza is under siege," Yousef added. "Watched by tanks and drones equipped with the latest technology and the most powerful weapons."

It seems unlikely that Hamas will accept criticism or acknowledge its decline in popularity in Gaza. Naturally, it will neither surrender nor hand over its weapons, even if it continues fighting alone. 

This is something that figures like U.S. President Donald Trump fail to grasp. He treats the situation as though it were an American movie, where the "hero" always defeats the "bad guys." Even as we write this article, he is issuing new statements warning Hamas to surrender: "Release all hostages now, or all bets are off."

But this threat no longer matters to Hamas—it no longer listens to the voices of Gazans, whether in negotiations on their behalf or in its conduct on the ground. Instead, it treats them as outside the national ranks, while residents continue to pay with their lives and the lives of their loved ones for a decision that has driven everyone to the edge of the abyss—thus embodying the words of the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche: “If you gaze long into an abyss, the abyss also gazes into you.” 

But this threat no longer matters to Hamas—to the point that it no longer heeds the voices of Gazans, whether in negotiations on their behalf or in its conduct on the ground. Instead, it treats them as outside the national ranks, while residents continue to pay with their lives and the lives of their loved ones for a decision that has driven everyone to the edge of the abyss. And in the words of German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche: "If you gaze long into an abyss, the abyss also gazes into you."

This is an edited translation of the Arabic original. Translated by Maram Taylor.