It's almost two months since Hamas, a group regarded as a terrorist organisation by the United States (US) and the European Union (EU), including Ireland, launched its unprecedented attacks on Israel which killed 1,200 people and saw the taking of roughly 240 hostages.
The response from Israel was swift. More than 15,000 people have reportedly been killed in Gaza since the 7 October attacks leading to what UN General Secretary Antonio Guterres has called an "epic humanitarian catastrophe."
On Saturday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu pledged to continue the conflict "until the end" and vowed "total victory" over Hamas — a signal that there is no end in sight to the current war.
But what do we know about what Hamas was hoping to achieve with its attacks on 7 October and what is its strategy now?
Oonagh Smyth spoke to three Hamas experts about the motivations of the deeply religious, heavily armed and socially conservative movement.
The objective of Hamas’ 7 October attacks, by far the most deadly and bloody attack ever carried out against Israel, was to end the political status quo, to highlight the Palestinian cause and to restart the political process towards a two-state solution, according to long-time observers of the Palestinian militant group.
Dr May Darwich, Associate Professor of the International Relations of the Middle East at Birmingham University, said the attacks followed years of resentment over Israel’s settlement expansion in the West Bank and a 17-year blockade of Gaza.
"It's the longest blockade in modern history," Dr Darwich said.
"It's the longest blockade of people not allowed movement, not allowed basic human rights. We sometimes talk from positions of privilege that we say, 'Oh, Hamas is not rational, because they could have prevented this by just staying quiet'."
Dr Darwich said that from the viewpoint of Hamas, the atrocities were an act of desperation.
"They have a completely different mindset and different life experience [to us]. They're coming from a corner where it's very dark and there is no other option for them. ‘We're dying anyway, so it's either we die waiting for Israel to attack us, or we fight back,’ that's their position."
Dr Darwich said that the election of Benjamin Netanyahu’s government in November 2022, was a turning point for the Hamas’ leadership.
"From the perspective of Hamas, the political path for any prospect for solving the conflict has been ended with the right-wing government in Israel," she said.
Dr Belal Shobaki, Head of the Political Science Department at Hebron University in the West Bank, said the Israeli government "pushed" Hamas to its limits.
Israel's right-wing political parties "believed that they have to end the conflict with the Palestinians, not through the negotiations or the political process, but through their aggressive policies toward the Palestinians, especially in West Bank and Jerusalem," Dr Shobaki said.
Attack organisers
While it’s understood that there was some consultation within Hamas’ complex political organisational structure — across Qatar, Lebanon and the global Palestinian diaspora — its leader in Gaza, Yahya Sinwar, and the leader of its paramilitary wing the Al-Qassam Brigades, Mohammed Deif, are believed to have masterminded the 7 October attacks.
In this sense, Dr Darwich said, it is a "ground up" response from within Gaza against Israeli policies.
Dr Darwich believes that Hamas was also provoked by Israeli government’s policies of annexing parts of Palestinian east Jerusalem and particularly in relation to its treatment of the Al-Aqsa mosque, a site that is regarded as the third most important in Islam.
"The desecration of Al-Aqsa mosque and the compound by the Israeli right-wing government has been a constant provocation for Hamas, a constant provocation for all Muslims," Dr Darwich said.
The Al-Aqsa compound has long been a flashpoint over matters of sovereignty and religion in Jerusalem.
Under the longstanding "status quo" arrangement governing the area, which Israel says it maintains, non-Muslims can visit but only Muslims are allowed to worship in the mosque compound.
The sacred compound has long been the site of clashes between Israelis and Palestinians, including in the weeks leading up to 7 October.
Two-state solution
Despite international revulsion and condemnation of the atrocities, Belal Shobaki from Hebron University, believes one of Hamas’ motivations for the 7 October attacks was to put the Palestinian cause back on the international political agenda and he said that they have succeeded in achieving that.
"If you want to understand if they achieve or not, you can see or you can follow the news about a new discourse from the western community, especially from the EU, and from the Americans, from the Arab countries. There are those who start talking again about the two-state solution," Dr Shobaki said.
Some observers say Hamas has been seeking legitimacy as a political actor since it published its political charter in 2017.
They were founded on outright opposition to the Israeli state but appeared to soften their approach in 2017, even going as far as to accept the formation of a Palestinian state along the 1967 borders.
Hamas' apparent move towards moderations has been rebuffed however, not just by Israel, but by many in the international community, including the US and EU, where it remains a proscribed organisation.
While the charter called for the recognition of Palestinian statehood on lands currently occupied by Israel in Gaza, the West Bank and East Jerusalem, it refused to recognise the state of Israel, stating that, "There shall be no recognition of the legitimacy of the Zionist entity."
However, Hamas’ leaders made it known that its recognition of Israel was dependent on Palestinian statehood being recognised.
Hamas was understood therefore to be endorsing political dialogue towards a two-state solution, according to Ibrahim Natil, a research fellow at Dublin City University (DCU) and author of Hamas Transformation: Opportunities and Challenges.
"They believe that it's a mutual recognition based on a political outcome," Mr Natil said.
Regional war
In the aftermath of the atrocities, Hamas’ leaders called on all its regional supporters and allies to attack Israel and re-draw the regional map.
Mohammed Dief has been recorded saying: "We are announcing the Al-Aqsa Floods. It is the time to unite. All the Arab and Islamic powers to overthrow the Israeli occupation."
But this has not happened.
"They were thinking that other parties, other groups, other countries maybe will participate, but they did not. So, they found themselves alone," Dr Shobaki said.
Dr May Darwich from the University of Birmingham agreed.
"Iran is not interested in a war. Since it started, it's been sending messages repeatedly to the US, to the EU, that they're not interested in a war. And, even if they wouldn't do it in a direct way, the same thing for Hezbollah," Dr Darwich said.
Dr Shobaki also said that Hamas hoped that Palestinians in the West Bank would launch attacks against Israel, like in the first and second intifadas, but this also didn’t happen.
"The Israelis also conducted new policies in the West Bank from the day one of the war.
"They closed all of the cities with checkpoints. They closed the gates between the village and the cities. They did not allow the Palestinians to go out from their places," Dr Shobaki said.
Hostage-prisoner exchanges
Another key Hamas motivation for 7 October was hostage-taking. This allowed them to create a bargaining position for the freeing of Palestinian prisoners held in Israeli jails.
Nearly 6,000 Palestinian prisoners were estimated to be held in Israeli jails as recently as September, according to B'tselem, the Israel Information Centre for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories.
During the short six-day ceasefire between Hamas and Israel, which ran from 24-30 November, 240 Palestinian prisoners were released.
That was in exchange for 105 hostages held by Hamas.
However, more than 3,000 Palestinians have been arrested in the West Bank and East Jerusalem since 7 October, according to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.
Another widely held theory for the 7 October attacks is that Hamas was seeking to halt the Arab-Israeli normalisation policy, which saw Israel creating economic relationships neighbouring Arab states.
In 2020, Israel signed bilateral economic agreements called the Abraham Accords with the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain and was seeking to have a similar agreement with Saudi Arabia.
The Hamas attacks may have this effect in the short-term given the anger amongst ordinary Arabs, according to Dr Shobaki.
"If we are talking about normalisation between some Arab countries and the Israelis nowadays, it doesn't mean anything, because no one can claim after 7 October that the Israelis are welcomed in any Arab countries," said Dr Shobaki.
DCU Research Fellow Ibrahim Natil disagreed. "It’s a matter of time. After the war, I think the normalisation will continue."
The future
So, what is the Hamas strategy now?
"Hamas may believe it has had some success by showing it is a power to contend with. We are talking nowadays that the Israelis are negotiating with Hamas through the Qataris and the Egyptians.
"It means that Hamas still exists and Hamas still a power in Gaza Strip and they have to negotiate with them," Dr Shobaki said.
And while it’s hard to believe that the people of Gaza could describe Hamas as providing good leadership, history tells us that in Gaza things are viewed differently, according to Dr Darwich.
"One might think that with all the people in Gaza are going through from destruction, death, injuries, lack of food, lack of medicine, lack of water, that they would be turning against Hamas. But it's the total opposite that they are even supporting Hamas more than ever.
"This trend has been on and on with every war in 2009, in 2011, 2014. Every time, the war only increased the legitimacy of Hamas because it seemed the only resistance movement that is able to stand in the face of Israel. Every war with Israel increases Hamas’ popularity."
Watch Oonagh Smyth’s report on Hamas’ strategy and motivations on the RTÉ Player.
