The Palestinian national issue has dominated the regional politics of the Middle East like no other conflict in the post-World War 2 era, eliciting global solidarity and support for decades. The Palestinians’ long statelessness, unending armed struggle, and the painful failure of their leaders like Yasser Arafat in the Oslo Peace Process of the 1990s have compounded their plight. Popular opinion and international sympathy have often been on their side, but the Palestinians are dejected, helpless, and waiting for their own strong leadership to rise and stand up for them.
Neither the militant Hamas nor the autocratic Palestinian Authority under Mahmoud Abbas inspire much confidence among Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank, two surveys conducted this year reveal.
Last true leader of the Palestinians
Yasser Arafat was an exceptionally talented leader who awakened the Palestinians to stand for their liberation rather than relying on the Arab world or Pan-Islam in the early 1960s. He exposed the vested interests of the Arab states as much as the great power politics of the Western world. By blending anti-colonialism, Marxism-Leninism, Arab Nationalism, ‘Third World’ solidarity, and Islam, he framed the Palestinian question impactfully for international attention as an issue of self-determination.
In 1974, the United Nations invited him to address the General Assembly, an exceptional honour for a non-representative of a member state. His speech was admired and he received a standing ovation. That historic speech is still remembered for Arafat’s famous line: “I have come bearing an olive branch and freedom fighter’s gun. Do not let the olive branch fall from my hands.” After flirting with the armed struggle, he accepted the two-state solution in 1988 and joined the Oslo Peace Process, shaking the hand of Israel’s Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin in 1993.
Around this period, Hamas emerged, challenging Arafat’s ideas of national liberation in a secular fashion, labelling him a traitor for recognising Israel and negotiating over the two-state solution. Hamas defined the Palestinian struggle in religious terms and called for jihad that would liberate the whole of Palestine.
While many in India or abroad debate over whether to call Hamas a terrorist group or not, Arafat was clear that it was unequivocally so when the outfit unleashed suicide bombings in Israeli buses and coffee houses in the 1990s. In his 1996 speech in Egypt, Arafat spoke against the suicide bombings of Hamas. “We are confronting and will continue to confront terrorism and to uproot it from our land, because our dream of freedom, independence, and self-determination cannot bear fruit and be realised amid a sea of blood and tears, but by perseverance in confronting this terrorism and these extremist and dangerous wings of Hamas and the [Islamic] Jihad,” he said.
The Oslo Peace Process failed due to various complex factors, events, and ideas that can’t be elaborated here. Even when it failed, the Oslo moment was a historical phase in the Israel-Palestine conflict. After Arafat’s death and the armed takeover of Gaza by Hamas in 2007, the Palestinians had to endure a civil war-like situation between the Palestinian Authority and Hamas. Meanwhile, under the long tenure of Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel turned away from the idea of or need for a two-state solution.
So, how do Palestinians view their struggle, future, and the two-state solution? Who represents them the most, the Palestinian Authority or Hamas? Two surveys, one just before the ongoing conflict with Israel and the other during it, reveal a promising yet complex picture.
Little trust in Hamas
The Arab Barometer, a nonpartisan organisation that claims to have the largest database of Arab people’s views, conducted a survey called ‘What Palestinians Really Think of Hamas’ just before the Israel attaack. The survey included 790 respondents in the West Bank and 399 in Gaza, all interviewed between 28 September and 8 October. Interviews in Gaza were completed on 6 October, just a day before the Hamas attack.
The survey results show that a vast majority of Gazan respondents—close to 70 per cent—do not trust Hamas for their everyday well-being or their struggle for statehood. The survey also revealed that most are not aligned with Hamas’ religious ideology and jihad. The majority of survey respondents favoured a two-state solution with an independent Palestine and Israel existing side by side, in contrast to Hamas’ determination to destroy Israel.
The respondents were also asked to choose a president from Ismail Haniyeh, leader of Hamas, Mahmoud Abbas, the chairman of the Palestinian Authority, and Marwan Barghouti, a Fatah member currently in an Israeli prison. The largest share of respondents (32 per cent) chose Barghouti, while 12 per cent and 24 per cent picked Abbas and Haniyeh, respectively.
It is worth underscoring again that the people of Gaza did not choose Hamas at any point as their elected body. They had to accept it as their governing entity when it took over control from the Palestinian Authority by force in 2007.
Around 31 per cent of respondents attributed the food insecurity and economic hardships to the mismanagement of Hamas rather than the economic blockade imposed by Israel since 2007.
Among the Gazans, 27 per cent prefer Hamas as their preferred party, while 30 per cent prefer Fatah. A large majority, 73 per cent, prefer the peaceful settlement of their conflict, and 54 per cent support the two-state solution (in the 2021 survey, it was 58 per cent).
On international matters, 71 per cent of the people of Gaza opposed Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. And 37 per cent supported developing stronger economic ties with the US, surpassing the support for Iran or Russia (32 per cent for both).
Despite the survey’s small sample size, the findings reflect that most Palestinians seek normalcy. They express a preference for a rational and peaceful ecosystem to live in rather than the fanatic approach of Hamas. Many agree with the idea of the two-state solution—something that many may consider a gone scenario now. Contrary to the militant Hamas leaders, they prefer compromise and practical solutions to their problems rather than seeking historical justice and fighting in the name of Al-Aqsa or jihad.
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What war-time survey revealed
The Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research, a globally known Ramallah-based organisation led by Professor Khalil Shikaki, conducted a wartime survey from 22 November to 2 December 2023. The sample comprised 1,231 adults—750 interviewed in the West Bank and 481 in Gaza.
This survey revealed broad public support for Hamas in the aftermath of the 7 October attack. When asked whether Hamas was correct to attack Israel the way it did, 72 per cent expressed support— but they denied that Hamas carried out brutal attacks on Israeli women, children, and the elderly.
The prolonged conflict has also increased the popularity of Hamas vis-à-vis the Palestinian Authority. While 64 per cent of respondents said the Palestinian Authority should not govern Gaza after the war, an equal number posited that Hamas will be able to retain its influence there.
Despite perceiving Western countries as unfair to them, most Palestinians tend to believe in the seriousness of the two-state solution proposed by the United States and the European Union.
However, Shikaki notes that flare-ups of violence often help Hamas gain more support. On 7 October, the fact that Hamas entirely overran Israeli border security and intelligence garnered it more public support.
Both surveys have a few things in common. The Palestinians do not trust or want Mahmoud Abbas to continue as the head of the Palestinian Authority. In the post-war survey, the demand for Abbas’ resignation stands at 92 per cent in the West Bank and 81 per cent in Gaza.
Their narrow or wide support for Hamas is partly subject to the failure of the Palestinian Authority. In the last three months of war, support for Hamas grew from 12 per cent to 43 per cent in the West Bank, and from 38 per cent to 42 per cent in Gaza.
While there are concerns that Palestinians may continue supporting Hamas as their representative party, Shikaki is optimistic that it won’t happen. Hamas is unlikely to have the means to lead the Palestinian cause politically or diplomatically after the terror acts of 7 October, and it remains a fighting militia in or outside of Gaza against Israel. But the Palestinian cause needs leaders, not militias.
Dr Khinvraj Jangid writes from Tel Aviv. He is Associate Professor and Director, Centre for Israel Studies, Jindal School of International Affairs, OP Jindal Global University, Sonipat. He is visiting faculty at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Israel. Views are personal.
(Edited by Asavari Singh)