Publications

While the war in Gaza continues, along with concerns for the fate of the Israeli hostages held by Hamas, a lively Palestinian and broader Arab discussion is developing regarding the outcomes and implications of the war Hamas initiated on October 7. Alongside the deepening recognition of Israeli power and growing concerns over Israeli–American hegemony in the region, a prominent question arises about the future of armed resistance, or, in the terms of the analysts, the future of the militias, given the severe blow to Iran’s “axis of resistance” and the new options emerging in the Middle East. The fate of movements like Hezbollah, Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and satellite organizations of the Muslim Brotherhood, as well as Shiite militias in Iraq and Kurdish undergrounds, is being examined not only organizationally but also ideologically and pragmatically. What is the point of continuing armed resistance if it only causes harm and does not serve its founding purpose?

Ahmed Yousef, a Hamas figure and former advisor to Ismail Haniyeh, recently published a series of articles calling on the Muslim Brotherhood to undertake profound soul-searching, arguing that nearly 100 years after its founding, the movement’s failures outweigh its successes. Since the Arab regimes view Hamas as part of the Brotherhood, they feel justified in ignoring the “mass destruction” taking place in Gaza and even in conspiring against the Islamic resistance movements wherever they may be, portraying them as their declared adversary. Yousef proposes that Hamas and the Brotherhood look back and adopt new courses of action, by better recognizing the limits of power and reality and changing the message they convey to the public. He proposes abandoning all forms of violence, focusing instead on nonviolent protest, and “explicitly renouncing armed violence in domestic and all other arenas where weapons are used in the name of Islam,” so Islam will not be branded as a religion of terror and to prevent foreign intervention. Yousef also suggests strengthening ties with Arab regimes, avoiding any escalation with them, and forming protective partnerships with the state.

Muslim thinkers, some of whom are quoted by Yousef, also emphasize similar messages. Among them is Saad Eddine El Othmani, formerly Morocco’s prime minister from the Islamic party, who argues that every reform must be carried out in partnership with the state and not in opposition to it. Ahmed Raissouni, also from Morocco and former president of the International Union of Muslim Scholars, argues that anyone issuing religious rulings without considering reality invalidates those rulings. Mohamed Selim El-Awa, an Egyptian academic and respected scholar, who also headed the same organization, maintains that societies are not led from the pulpit of the mosque but rather through constant engagement with the field. In Jordan, where open displays of sympathy for Hamas followed the October 7 attack, Muslim thinkers see cooperation with the regime as strengthening the Islamic message, not weakening it.

This line of thought can also be seen as a response to the fact that Arab states, shortly after October 7, began taking measures aimed at restricting the activities of Islamic movements and associations, such as:

In Egypt, where the Muslim Brotherhood has been in decline since President Morsi’s ouster in 2013, several measures were taken against the movement’s institutions and activists, including drying up their funding sources and deep intelligence infiltration.

In Jordan, the Muslim Brotherhood was outlawed in April 2025, and all activity by affiliated associations and bodies has been banned.

In Tunisia, surveillance of the Brotherhood has increased since 2021 and recently reached unprecedented levels. Rached Ghannouchi, leader of Tunisia’s Ennahda Movement, affiliated with the Brotherhood, was sentenced to 14 years in prison for harming state security, along with other senior movement officials.

In Morocco, the Islamist party, the Justice and Development Party, has been in decline since 2016 and has suffered from a loss of popularity.

In Syria, the new president, Ahmed al-Sharaa—a former al-Qaeda member dealing with severe instability—rejected the Brotherhood’s request to reopen its offices in the country.

In Lebanon, the issue of disarming Hezbollah has become a topic of public and official discourse following the severe blow it suffered and widespread calls to prevent non-state actors from holding weapons.

European countries have also joined the fight against the Muslim Brotherhood. In particular, President Emmanuel Macron is advancing legislation aimed at preventing Brotherhood infiltration into government institutions.

The implication is that the legitimacy Hamas once enjoyed, due to its resistance to the Israeli “occupation” and shared by other Islamic movements, has significantly diminished since the October 7 massacre. It crossed the boundaries of what was considered a legitimate act of “resistance” and is now perceived as advancing a foreign agenda in the Arab world. Even the popular sympathy Hamas enjoyed in the days and weeks immediately after the massacre is waning, given the war’s devastating consequences, which have not softened the positions of the various states toward the Muslim Brotherhood.

At this stage of addressing these outcomes, public discourse is heavily focused on the future of Islamic movements and associations, amid harsh condemnation of Hamas from within, as well as from non-Islamic bodies that are more aligned with state institutions, such as the Palestinian Authority (PA) in the Palestinian context. Critics view the Brotherhood as being directly responsible for the new disaster (naksa) that has befallen Gaza and the Palestinian issue because of its long-standing support for Hamas. The belief that the October 7 attack would help the factions of the Brotherhood regain eroded power has been disappointing, as the results of the attack have been, in fact, the opposite. Moreover, Hamas’s refusal to release the hostages since October 7 and its insistence during negotiations on securing its survival as a resistance movement, at the cost of immense suffering to Gaza’s population, are, according to the critics, proof of the opportunism and “hypocrisy” that characterize Hamas and its Islamic counterparts.

However, this anger pales in comparison to the condition of the Palestinian arena, its suffering, losses, and fears since Hamas launched the war. The PA sees it as Hamas’s war—not the Palestinians’—refuses to assist it, and even wishes for its elimination as a military entity. PA Chairman Abu Mazen passed a resolution at the Arab League summit in Baghdad in May 2025 calling on Hamas to hand over the hostages to Israel, disarm, and transfer control of the Gaza Strip to the PA. Similar positions aiming to exclude Hamas from governance are expressed by prominent Arab commentators specializing in Arab–Israel relations. Their view is that Palestinians must now focus on preserving what remains, anchoring the Palestinian people in their land, and remembering that eventually, they will have to live with Israel (“Not everyone is Benjamin Netanyahu,” they note). Furthermore, critics argue that a Palestinian entity is needed—one that draws its authority from the PLO, pushes Hamas outside the framework, rebuilds the Palestinian home, and lays the foundation for a state.

Great concern also characterizes the words of Hamas supporters and sympathizers, who have observed developments in Gaza and the region and have drawn far-reaching conclusions. Khaled Hroub, a leading scholar on Hamas and Islamic movements and a Palestinian by origin, close to Hamas leaders and respected by them, argues that armed resistance must change and cannot continue following the events of October 7. The “settler imperialism” (emphatically not Zionist, he notes) differs from British and French imperialism. It does not leave; it stays, claims the land as its own, and demands the removal of the local population. This is an imperialism with eyes on all the territory between the sea and the river. Unfortunately, Hroub says, Israel enjoys a “green light” from the United States and European countries, which allow it to do as it pleases. Therefore, Palestinians must choose between despair and developing new methods of resistance to prevent the disintegration of the Palestinian people. As an example, he mentions Gandhi’s struggle against the British. He believes the ultimate test of Palestinian cohesion will come after the war, when borders and airports reopen, and he expects many will leave the Strip as it is no longer livable. Thus, a mechanism must be developed to keep residents in place.

This distinction between Israeli presence and the imperialism of past powers may suggest an expanding acceptance that Israel is not a temporary reality among those who previously denied it. This statement aligns with Hroub’s repeated warnings against Israeli efforts to fragment the Palestinian people into clans and subgroups.

The reality in which Israel has been fighting hostile actors in the Middle East for years, who reject its existence, is a sort of laboratory in which shifts occur in their positions. The Arab states have expressed such shifts since the late 1970s, when they began abandoning the aspiration to remove Israel from the region and signed peace agreements with it. One highlight of the process was the PLO’s adoption of the principle of territorial compromise and the two-state solution in the late 1980s. In the early 2000s, the Arab League expressed willingness to recognize Israel and coexist in exchange for a mutually agreed resolution to the Palestinian issue. As it becomes clearer that friction with and resistance against Israel does not destabilize it but rather strengthens it and its influence, Israel’s adversaries are compelled to reassess their positions. Now, many influential voices in the Arab world, including those close to Hamas, are calling on the organization and ideologically aligned militias to lay down their arms and cease armed resistance.

Israel can contribute greatly to this process if it chooses to see as a partner in a political process those who already recognize its existence, have abandoned the armed struggle, support negotiations, and are ready to live alongside it. This refers to the PA, which is seen by the Arab world and the international community as the legitimate representative of the Palestinian people. However, the current Israeli government refuses to acknowledge this, despite previous governments having recognized the PA in principle as a partner in efforts to advance a settlement.