Hamas and the Arab Spring: Strategic Shifts?

Hamas-PLO/Fatah Reconciliation and Rapprochement within the Unfolding Regional Order in the Middle East since 2010: Neorealist and Neoclassical Realist Perspectives

“…As a result, Hamas moved its dependence to the new elected-reformist camp led by Turkey, Qatar and Egypt (Mursi-Administration) (Demirtaş, 2015). This alignment has improved Hamas' relationships with Libya, Morocco, and Tunisia, states that witnessed political changes to the advantage of Islamist-based political parties (Milton-Edwards, 2013). From the viewpoint of neoclassical realism, idea-based and interest-based motivations caused Hamas's alienation .…”

“…In entering into a novel alliance, Hamas's political bureau sought novel allies that would likely extend their effective strategic/security guarantee to Gaza in general and Hamas in particular (i.e., bystanding). Hamas likely hoped/expected that the new distribution of power in the region would end its diplomatic isolation and combat the economic sanctions maintained by Israel and co-implemented by the former Egyptian government (Milton-Edwards, 2013). Hamas's novel alignment could boost its internal balancing if its novel allies would address the humanitarian crisis of the Palestinians in Gaza (Howeidy, 2013).…”

“…The aforementioned upgrade of Hamas's regional standing had implications for (geo)political affairs vis-à-vis Israel and Fatah, as was apparent, for example, in the unprecedented prisoner exchange between Israel and Hamas, October 2011, (Levy, 2011) together with the concessions that Israel made to Hamas's requests in the wake of the Pillar of Defense military operation in November 2012 (Milton-Edwards, 2013). Both agreements utilized, to a certain degree, changes in the distribution of power and acute insecurities in the Middle East.…”

“…They demonstrated to Palestinians (of both above mentioned streams) the importance of balancing to extract compromises from the Israeli side; they simultaneously demonstrated the futility of negotiated political reconciliation with the right-wing government in Israel (Pace, 2013). Hamas's achievements placed the moderate line (i.e., Fatah) in an awkward position because the agreements between Israel and Hamas showed that Israel was prepared to compromise on specific issues that it would otherwise have vetoed (Milton-Edwards, 2013). This awareness hardened the positions of followers of the moderate stream (inter alia, in Fatah) that political concessions cannot be negotiated with Israel's current leadership through political settlement (Bronner, 2012).…”

Analysing security subcomplexes in a changing Middle East—the role of non-Arab state actors and non-state actors

“…Related to the complex role of the non-Arab states in the region, a number of important non-state actors are also influencing the recent turmoil in the Middle East. This is the case for well-known actors like Hezbollah and Hamas, but also for organizations that have more recently entered the political scene, like Islamic State (IS, or Da'esh) (Milton-Edwards, 2013;Juneau, 2015).…”