Can new Hamas chief Yahya Sinwar achieve Palestinian unity?

On 6 August, Yahya Sinwar, one of the principal architects of the 7 October offensive, was unanimously chosen as the new political leader of Hamas following the assassination of Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran last week.

Sinwar had been the top Hamas leader in Gaza since 2017 and was long known for his efforts to advance Palestinian internal reconciliation talks.

Unlike other Hamas officials who took a harder line, Sinwar's tone was far more conciliatory. His rhetoric was often characteristic of a charm offensive, as he embraced other Palestinian leaders and saluted the late head of the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO), Yasser Arafat.

Sinwar even called on Fatah's leadership to return to Gaza and manage its civilian affairs, though his offer was summarily rejected.

He was also the visionary behind the 2018-2019 Gaza Great March of Return protests, which demanded an end to the blockade and the right of return for refugees. Sinwar had invited Fatah to join this non-violent mass movement, but his offers were once again rebuffed. During that time, Israeli forces killed nearly 230 peaceful Palestinian protesters.

Sinwar also mended Hamas's relations with several Arab regimes, such as Egypt, and was instrumental in the group's rapprochement with Syria two years ago.

After several failed attempts at reconciliation, many observers are now contemplating the unique role Sinwar may play in achieving unity among the Palestinian factions.

The newly appointed leader, whose interim position lasts until the end of Haniyeh's term in May 2025, is expected to continue seeking common ground with the Palestinian Authority (PA) leaders.

However, given the insurmountable differences in political strategy and approach within the Palestinian organisations - let alone the role Fatah-supported PA has played in Gaza's economic and political collapse - such attempts will most likely fail.

Failed attempts

On 23 July, just eight days before Haniyeh's assassination, 14 Palestinian factions met in Beijing at the invitation of the Chinese government to sign yet another declaration of unity while calling for a new "national unity government" in Ramallah.

The meeting was the 23rd such attempt at reconciliation between the two main Palestinian factions, Fatah and Hamas, since 2007.

Previous meetings had taken place, and declarations were signed across the region, including in Mecca; Doha; Cairo; Sanaa; Beirut; Algiers; and El-Alamein; as well as internationally in Istanbul and Moscow.

Under Abbas's leadership, none of the signed agreements between Fatah and Hamas were implemented, and all unity talks ended in vain

The Beijing Declaration was very similar in nature and content to the Cairo declaration of 2011 and the Algiers reconciliation agreement in 2022. The parties had agreed to form a unity government, hold elections, and end the ongoing harassment and detention of political activists.

In 2017, Sinwar helped lead reconciliation talks in Cairo between Hamas and Fatah, having personally invited PA President Mahmoud Abbas to lead the meetings in Gaza. At the time, Hamas made significant concessions, including giving up all the senior government positions to the Fatah-controlled PA and allowing 3,000 PA security officers to deploy in Gaza.

The two parties signed an agreement in October of that year. However, despite many pleas from Hamas leaders, Abbas failed to implement the deal.

Two months later, in December, then-US President Donald Trump declared Jerusalem as the capital of Israel and announced his plans to relocate the US embassy, shattering the veneer of the so-called "peace process".

What should have been an extraordinary show of Palestinian unity in the face of this unprecedented assault on Palestinian rights was instead a missed opportunity.  

Under Abbas's leadership, none of the signed agreements were implemented, and all ended in vain.

'Rigged process'

The Beijing Declaration came amid a genocidal war waged by the Zionist regime for the past ten months, which has claimed well over 50,000 Palestinian lives, including those under the rubble, and over 100,000 injured.

Many observers wondered whether the Beijing agreement would be any different from previous ones that failed to bridge the gap between the rival groups since they split following Hamas's democratic victory in the 2006 elections and assumption of power in Gaza in 2007.

For decades, Palestinians were united on the goal of the liberation of Palestine and the restoration of Palestinian rights, particularly the right of return of Palestinian refugees, a right enshrined in UN Resolution 194 after the 1948 Nakba.

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In fact, the main purpose of the establishment of the PLO in 1964 was to fulfil these goals.

Since 1974, however, the Fatah-led PLO has opted for a political process centred on the establishment of a Palestinian state.

This process culminated in the 1993 signing of the Oslo Accords when the then-Fatah leader and PLO head Arafat recognised Israel on 78 percent of historical Palestine in return for a truncated Palestinian state on the remaining 22 percent, which included Gaza, the West Bank, and East Jerusalem.

For more than 30 years, Abbas, Arafat's successor since 2005 as the head of the PLO, the PA, and Fatah, has failed to bring about a viable political settlement while Israel has been consolidating its control over the West Bank, with the number of Israeli settlers mushrooming to over sevenfold, or about 800,000 since 1993.

Even the Obama administration admitted this reality in 2016 when it allowed UN Security Council resolution 2334, which condemned Israeli settlements, to pass without an American veto.

A few days later, Obama's Secretary of State, John Kerry, gave a speech that declared the so-called two-state solution all but dead.

In addition, in recent years, Israel has instituted an aggressive policy of Judaisation in Jerusalem, particularly of the Muslim Holy shrines in the Al-Aqsa Mosque complex, or Haram al-Sharif.

Therefore, over many years, Palestinians under occupation lost hope in this rigged process, as Hamas's electoral success in the 2006 elections demonstrated and as polls have consistently confirmed ever since.

No legitimacy

Aside from the ideological and political differences between the Palestinian factions, another critical reason for their failure to reconcile has been the interference of Fatah's benefactors wanting to secure their own interests.

In any unity agreement, Israel, the US and its Arab allies would not be able to control the PA or dictate terms to its officials who are beholden to them for economic sustenance and political legitimacy.

While Fatah dominates the PA, it remains part of the PLO, along with other smaller parties.

However, Hamas and its sister organisation, Islamic Jihad, are not part of the PLO and have been the two main groups leading the resistance and military confrontation against the Israeli occupation since 1993.

The two Islamic movements have rejected the flawed Oslo process that utterly failed to produce a Palestinian state on the occupied 1967 territories.

Abbas and Fatah, on the other hand, have insisted on staying the course despite having very little to show for it.

In previous meetings, Abbas insisted that all factions, particularly Hamas and Islamic Jihad, accept three conditions of his political program: 1) To recognise all of the agreements the PA has signed with Israel, including security coordination that serves to safeguard the occupation; 2) recognise the state of Israel and endorse the negotiations-only strategy for the so-called two-state solution despite its failures and unviable plans; and 3) abandon any notion of armed resistance by giving up their military hardware or at least place it under Abbas's control.

These conditions, which have yielded no results for more than 30 years, have been a major obstacle to reaching genuine reconciliation or an agreement between the parties.

Both Hamas and Islamic Jihad have argued that agreeing to such conditions would be tantamount to giving up the essence of their existence and goals for their movements.

Meanwhile, Abbas and his allies knew that admitting to the disastrous outcome of their political path would expose their failed strategy, resulting in a total loss of their already diminished credibility and possibly paying a heavy political price.

During this impasse, Abbas relied on a regional and international order to provide him the legitimacy he lacked among his own people.

His status as PA president expired in 2010, and he has since refused to hold any elections given what many viewed would be an inevitable loss.

Since 2011, all of the agreements negotiated by the Palestinian factions, especially Fatah and Hamas, had called for new elections to take place, only to be cancelled shortly after by Abbas.

Shadow of war

As attempts at reconciliation have failed in the past, there is very little reason to expect that new talks among decaying leaders in a post-7 October climate would yield any success.

The recent Beijing talks were held in the shadow of Israel's genocidal war on Gaza, its total destruction of the tiny enclave, and its policies of effective annexation, as well as assassinations and extermination of political activists and resistance fighters in the West Bank.

Since October, more than 600 Palestinians in the West Bank have been killed, and more than 10,000 were detained.

In trying to restore his legitimacy, Abbas sent his representatives to Beijing. The octogenarian president has become increasingly irrelevant in the struggle and is trying to regain a consequential role in leading the Palestinian people.

Yet he seems to have learned nothing while refusing to admit failure or pursue an alternative strategy.

The PA and Abbas have also been missing in action when it comes to Israel's onslaught. Except for window dressing, they have failed to lead efforts to stop its ongoing aggression against Gaza or attacks on towns, villages, and refugee camps across the West Bank.

The PA did not even cease its security coordination with Israeli occupation forces during this time of unparalleled Israeli atrocities against Palestinians.

The PA did not even cease its security coordination with Israeli occupation forces during this time of unparalleled Israeli atrocities against Palestinians

Rather, Abbas's forces are part and parcel of the Israeli security system against the Palestinians.

For years, Hamas and other anti-Oslo groups have advocated for a united Palestinian strategy centred on resistance and for the termination of the flawed accords in order to challenge Israel's belligerent policies.

Abbas and Fatah rejected those calls to change course, insisting on pursuing a negotiations-only strategy that is stale, futile, and comes at the expense of Palestinian rights.

They maintained this position even as regional geopolitical transformations threatened the dissolution and marginalisation of the Palestinian cause.

The Abraham Accords, which normalised relations between the Zionist regime and several Arab states in 2020, was a manifestation of this policy.

Long before the 7 October Al-Aqsa Flood Operation, the Trump administration, followed by the Biden administration, had been working to advance a normalisation deal between Saudi Arabia and Israel that sidelined the Palestinians and ignored their plight.

Doubtful future

Diplomatically, states like South Africa and some European and Latin American countries have issued stronger statements and taken more forceful measures than the PA, such as suing Israel before international tribunals like the International Court of Justice.

Abbas and his cronies have been complicit with the US in plotting the future rule of Gaza in the so-called "day after". The PLO head has even blamed Hamas for the Israeli massacres and destruction of Gaza.

Still, to avoid perceptions of him entering Gaza on Israeli tanks, Abbas needed to engage Hamas in unity talks and receive their tacit blessings.

Hamas, on the other hand, has shown flexibility and political maturity despite the tremendous sacrifices the group has endured in leading the Palestinian struggle against Israeli aggression for several decades.

The resistance movement has repeatedly offered significant concessions and agreed to conciliatory language in its political positions and declarations. Yet the international system and regional order have insisted on its exclusion from playing any leading or meaningful role in the Palestinian struggle.

Therefore, one of the key motivations for Hamas, considered to be a "terrorist" group in the US, the UK and some other countries, to participate in the Beijing talks was to gain international recognition as a responsible stakeholder and legitimate player.

While Islamic Jihad has rejected any references in the declaration to a two-state solution or specific international resolutions that legitimise the Israeli state, Hamas has not openly expressed such reservations.

With the recent emergence of a multipolar world led by the US and China, the latter has been trying, to the US's detriment, to project itself as a reliable international actor and responsible great power.

As it played a leading role in the reconciliation talks between Saudi Arabia and Iran last year, it also wanted to be the venue for uniting the Palestinians in the hope that it could chart a new political course and play a leading role by joining or even supplanting the US in reaching a future Middle East settlement.

While the primary concern for Palestinians in the occupied territories and the diaspora has been the devastating Gaza war and its long-term impact on the struggle, there has been much scepticism among Palestinians about the Beijing Declaration - since they have seen this movie before.

Like other agreements, this declaration called for several concrete actions, such as the formation of a new interim reconciliation government, the urgent convening of a meeting by the heads of all the Palestinian factions, and the call for new elections.

But all these measures are at the discretion of Abbas, who has consistently ignored them in the past.

Will Abbas, who did not attend the Beijing talks but was represented by Fatah's second in command, change his mind and implement the Beijing agreement, which has simply reiterated previous ones? It is doubtful.

On the other hand, for many years, Sinwar has been very accommodating to many of his movement's historical protagonists, including former Gaza strongman and Fatah dissident Mohammad Dahlan, as well as other Palestinian factions and regional powers.

But with Sinwar ascending to Hamas's top leadership position, and despite his amiable personality and proclivity to unite various Palestinian factions around a common enemy, will he be willing to agree to Abbas's conditions in light of the earthquake unleashed by Al-Aqsa Flood? It is very unlikely.

And there it goes. As the famous dictum says: "Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results."

The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Eye.