English
By Georgia Kiosi, Analyst KEDISA
Origins
“Jihad is its path and death for the sake of Allah is the loftiest of wishes,” Hamas said in its first statement in the late 1980s.[1]
Since its creation in December 1987, Hamas, an Arabic acronym for the Islamic Resistance Movement, has invoked a Sunni extremist ideology and has used militant interpretations of Islam to lead efforts aimed at the destruction of Israel. Hamas was founded, in the early days of the first Intifada uprising, largely crafted by Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, who was the founder and spiritual leader of the movement.
Ideology
In 2017, a revised Hamas manifesto stated that “Hamas rejects any alternative to the full and complete liberation of Palestine, from the river to the sea. However, without compromising its rejection of the Zionist entity and without relinquishing any Palestinian rights, Hamas considers the establishment of a fully sovereign and independent Palestinian state, with Jerusalem as its capital along the lines of the 4th of June 1967, with the return of the refugees and the displaced to their homes from which they were expelled, to be a formula of national consensus.”[2]
After the deadly offensive orchestrated by Hamas against Israel on October 7th, 2023, Ismail Haniyeh, former chairman of the Hamas Political Bureau, invoked religious rhetoric claiming that “Today, the enemy has had a political, military, intelligence, security and moral defeat inflicted upon it, and we shall crown it, with the grace of God, with a crushing defeat that will expel it from our lands, our holy city of al Quds, our al Aqsa mosque, and the release of our prisoners from the jails of the Zionist occupation”[3]
Iran’s Role
Predominantly, Shiite Iran has armed, trained and funded Hamas since the late 1980s largely due to its opposition to Israel. Since their commencement, Iranian- Palestinian relations have functioned as a marriage of convenience based on Iran’s pursuit of security and the Palestinian need for sponsorship.[4]
More specifically, Iran gradually came to support Hamas with the aim to contain and preoccupy Israel which, along with the United States, has long been perceived as the greatest threat to its security and domestic stability.
Hamas also has sought to align itself with the so-called Sunni axis, namely Egypt and the Gulf monarchies such as Qatar.
Iranian officials first established contact with Palestinian leaders in Beirut in 1987 after Israel expelled them to Lebanon as part of its efforts to suppress the Palestinian national leadership in the occupied Gaza Strip and West Bank. Iranian- Palestinian relations were further strengthened in 1992, when Israel exiled hundreds more Hamas members to Marj al-Zuhur. Soon, Palestinian militants received training in the Beqaa Valley, in a camps run by the Iranian-backed Lebanese group Hezbollah.[5]
Since then, Hamas has grown stronger and stronger thanks to Iranian weaponry smuggled from Yemen and Sudan, transported through the Egyptian desert by Bedouin smugglers, and brought into Gaza through cross-border tunnels built by Hamas. Hamas’s tunnel network under Gaza is reported to span 300 miles and supposedly can reach depths of up to 20 stories, it enables its fighters to move concealed and avoid IDF attacks.[6] Iran has also trained Palestinian engineers to manufacture weapons locally.[7]
To be more specific, Hassan Salamah, the Hamas commander who was the mastermind behind the string of Hamas suicide bus bombings in February and March 1996, told the Israeli police, and later in an interview on CBS’s “60 Minutes”, that after undergoing ideological indoctrination training in Sudan he was sent to Syria and from there to Iran. Then, Osama Hamdan, Hamas’s representative to Iran at the time, met Salamah in Tehran, and he underwent three months of military training at the hands of Iranian trainers.[8]
Moreover, US and Israeli officials estimate that Iran provides Hamas at least $70m-$100m a year. Hamas former leader Ismail Haniyeh claimed in a 2022 interview with Al Jazeera that his group receives $70 million a year from Iran.[9]
Hamas’s Future
With its core leadership assassinated by Israel and with Iran’s axis on the decline, Hezbollah degraded, and the weapons-smuggling link through Syria gone with the collapse of the Assad regime, Hamas now finds itself geopolitically adrift, its geopolitical standing is more fragile than ever.
In the long run, Hamas’ ability to maintain power will depend on its ability to adapt to the shifting regional dynamics and to securing sustained external support. Possibly, Hamas may remain a leading but a weakened armed actor in Gaza.[10]
Sources
[1] Wilson Center. The Doctrine of Hamas. Wilson Center, 2025.
[2] Ibid.
[3] Ibid.
[4] Skare, Erik. “Iran, Hamas, and Islamic Jihad: A marriage of convenience”, European Council on Foreign Relations, 2023.
[5] Ibid.
[6] Levy, Ido. “The “Axis of Resistance” Strategy in the Israel-Hamas War”, MANARA MAGAZINE, Cambridge Middle East and North Africa Forum (MENAF), 2024.
[7] Skare, Erik. “Iran, Hamas, and Islamic Jihad: A marriage of convenience”, European Council on Foreign Relations, 2023.
[8] Levitt, Mathhew. “The Hamas-Iran Relationship”, The Jerusalem Strategic Tribune, 2023.
[9] Ibid.
[10] Luck, Taylor. “Hamas at Crossroads: Pragmatism, Isolation, and the Uncertain Path Ahead”, Wilson Center, 2025.
