Hamas’ new stature

While Hamas is no match to Israel militarily in terms of traditional warfare, the advent of rockets, missiles and drones in the Middle East has changed the rules of engagement between them.  

Hamas has demonstrated over the past few days that its rockets can now reach deep into Israel and successfully target major metropolises like Tel Aviv and in the process disrupt normal life across the entire country. 

Even Ben Gurion airport, the nerve centre of Israel and its gateway to the world, is now within reach of Hamas’ rockets, even though they are not very sophisticated in technology and many have been successfully intercepted by Israel’s defence system. 

Still the dynamics of the rivalry between the two sides has been dramatically changed of late, to the extent that indirect ceasefire talks between them have upgraded the status of Hamas as a major military and political player on the Palestinian front. 

Hamas’ confidence in its newly acquired status and role has enabled it to be more vocal on the entire Palestinian front including events in the West Bank which hitherto had been the exclusive domain of the Palestinian Authority (PA) under Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. 

Against this backdrop, the status of Abbas as the principal spokesperson for the Palestinians has eroded and probably undermined considerably by no other than Hamas, his partner in the newly formed Palestinian unity government. 

While the war on Gaza is taking a heavy toll on Gazans and destroying much of the coastal enclave’s infrastructure, Hamas still feels that it has emerged triumphant from the latest round of confrontation with Israel. 

Hamas may have wanted to duplicate the success  story of Israel’s war on Hizbollah in 2006 by demonstrating that it too can stand up to Israel’s war machine. 

Hizbollah emerged from that war more confident than ever as a major player after winning the hearts of many Arabs for its ability to withstand “mighty” Israel and its sophisticated war machine. 

Hamas, therefore, aims to extricate major political gains from its ongoing confrontation with Israel and from the looks of it, has already reaped political recognition as a major player that all sides must reckon with. 

All of a sudden, key capitals are knocking at the door of the Islamic group seeking their cooperation and consent for a ceasefire that can spare the area another major conflict. 

Against this backdrop, Hamas is projected to emerge as a major gainer from its confrontation with Israel.