Hamas has long been factionalized, but the Arab Spring has aggravated disagreements within Hamas' central leadership. In Gaza, there is the radical camp led by Foreign Minister Mahmoud al-Zahar and a moderate trend led by Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh. There are also differences between the Hamas core in Gaza and other members based in the West Bank (although secular rival Fatah continues to control most of the West Bank). At the highest level, there is a split between Haniyeh and the central leaders, including Khaled Meshaal, who for the past 13 years have been headquartered in Damascus.
When the Arab unrest reached Syria, Hamas' exiled leaders, who were already disadvantaged by not being in the Palestinian territories, were forced to relocate after refusing to publicly support the Syrian regime. As a result, various members of the group's political bureau left for such cities as Cairo, Amman and Doha.
Meanwhile, the rise of Islamists in the region has made the Hamas core less reliant on the exiled leadership for access to the outside world. In fact, with the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood's ascendance in Cairo, Gaza has become the center of the Palestinian movement.
Because of these developments, Meshaal and others outside Gaza have suddenly lost power and influence. They are now looking to redefine their roles with the organization in order to remain relevant. Hence, Meshaal's recent announcement that he would not compete in upcoming elections.
Meshaal has led Hamas since its founder, Sheikh Ahmed Yasin, was assassinated in an Israeli airstrike in 2004; he and his associates will not simply retire. Fortunately for Meshaal, the ascendance of Hamas as a political movement, particularly as its ideological allies in the Muslim Brotherhood are gaining power throughout the region, provides an opportunity for him to retain a leading role.
Reviving the Palestinian Muslim Brotherhood
There have been reports that Hamas is reviving the Palestinian branch of the Muslim Brotherhood and that Meshaal could become its general guide. Hamas succeeded the Palestinian Muslim Brotherhood, which was created in the mid-1930s and was a natural extension of the parent organization in Egypt. With the founding of Israel in 1948, the Palestinian branch became involved in the first Arab-Israeli War.
The Palestinian and Jordanian branches of the Brotherhood were part of a singular entity until 1967, when the third Arab-Israeli War began. Israel's occupation of the West Bank and Gaza severed the link between the two branches, and for the next 20 years the Palestinian branch focused on grassroots activism, becoming an alternative to Fatah and the Palestine Liberation Organization. In 1987, after the first intifada, Hamas was created to advance an Islamist strategy for ending Israel's occupation and creating a Palestinian state. Armed resistance was seen as a necessary path to create that state.
Hamas concentrated on fighting the Israeli occupation — a move in keeping with its rejection of the Oslo Accords signed in 1993. Hamas' use of urban terrorism against Israeli citizens isolated the group from the international community. The 9/11 attacks worsened that isolation. Meanwhile, after years of struggling, Israel succeeded in extensively damaging the network that provided Hamas and other Palestinian militant factions the ability to strike within Israel. in 2005, Israel withdrew from Gaza, tempering its status as an occupied territory.
For Hamas, controlling Gaza was not enough. The group began firing rockets from Gaza into Israeli territory to maintain its status as a resistance movement. But the major shift was Hamas' decision to accept the institutional framework of the Palestinian National Authority and move toward returning to its Muslim Brotherhood roots, pursuing power through democratic means even though Palestine was still a subnational entity.
Consequently, Hamas won the January 2006 Palestinian legislative elections by a landslide and moved to form a coalition government with Fatah, but the coalition did not last long. Gradually, Hamas' leadership and its parliamentarians in the West Bank were imprisoned by Israeli authorities, who were working with Fatah. Hamas turned to armed takeover to consolidate power in its core turf of Gaza, essentially solidifying the geopolitical divide between the two Palestinian territories and polities.
As a governing entity, Hamas has struggled to balance the imperatives of governance with its original platform of resistance. Indeed, Hamas has seen the rise of competing Islamist forces — Salafists and jihadists — to its right. At its core it has always subscribed to the Muslim Brotherhood belief of power through constitutional and electoral processes. But since it is also dealing with what it sees as an occupation, armed struggle against Israel has accompanied its approach to the intra-Palestinian issue.
But the 2011 Arab uprisings have created an opportunity for Hamas. The Brotherhood has been accepted by the world, particularly the United States, as demonstrated by election of Mohammed Morsi as the president of Egypt. In reviving the Palestinian Muslim Brotherhood, Hamas is likely looking to shed its proscription as a terrorist organization and to secure greater international legitimacy. If the Muslim Brotherhood has been accepted elsewhere, the thinking goes, eventually the Palestinian branch will be as well.
The Future of Hamas
It is not clear when Hamas will transform into the Palestinian Muslim Brotherhood, nor is it clear what shape the Palestinian branch will take. So long as there is no Palestinian state, Hamas cannot truly behave like its counterparts in Egypt, Jordan and elsewhere. Since a Palestinian state will not emerge anytime soon, Hamas will continue to struggle with its two roles: a political entity seeking to expand its power in the Palestinian territories and an armed force fighting Israeli occupation.
Since Meshaal has said Hamas will not abandon its resistance, it is unclear what will become of the group. Reviving the Brotherhood's Palestinian branch means forming a broad socio-political religious movement along the lines of the Egyptian and Jordanian branches. The Palestinian Muslim Brotherhood will likely have a political wing along the lines of the Egyptian Freedom and Justice Party and the Jordanian Islamic Action Front.
A key problem for a revived Palestinian Brotherhood will be that it will exist as an external entity — at least in the beginning — which will be a huge hurdle for Meshaal to overcome. Regardless of the exact structural reorganization, the revival of the Palestinian Muslim Brotherhood will be composed of the three parts: the wider Brotherhood movement, a political wing and an armed wing under the aegis of Hamas or some other group, such as the Izz al-Deen al-Qassam Brigades. Rather than subside, the internal power struggle will worsen because Palestine is not a real country, because there are both internal and external leadership factions and because of the geographical divide between Gaza and the West Bank.
As supreme guide of the Palestinian Muslim Brotherhood, Meshaal will focus on the West Bank. This is not just because Gaza is out of reach for him but also because he is a Jordanian citizen and the Hashemite kingdom has warmed to him. (This is partly because of Amman's need to manage its own Brotherhood branch and deal with the overall Palestinian issue.)
Jordan also is the gateway for the Palestinian Brotherhood to revive itself in the West Bank and truly position itself to take advantage of Fatah's weakness. Fatah is struggling due to its aging leadership and its notoriety for financial corruption and factionalism. The struggle is further complicated by the current financial crisis and the loss of international support Fatah chief and Palestinian National Authority President Abu Mazen experienced after he pushed for statehood at the United Nations.
Israel is likely to limit the extent to which the main Meshaal-led Palestinian Islamist movement will be able to progress in the West Bank. In Jordan, the revival of the Palestinian branch of the Muslim Brotherhood will complicate matters for its Jordanian counterpart, which has a substantial Palestinian component, no shortage of internal disagreements and a growing struggle with the monarchy.
Editor's Note: An earlier version of this analysis misstated which war began in 1967. It was the third Arab-Israeli War.
