Summary
Gaza’s post-war future is constrained by three interlocking realities. First, Hamas has been severely degraded militarily but is unlikely to disappear because it can rebuild, rebrand, and draw on enduring social support. Second, demilitarizing Gaza is not just about Hamas; many armed factions and clan militias operate there, and no actor currently has a credible monopoly on force. Third, decades of ideological indoctrination and structural hardship mean de-radicalization is a generational process that requires legitimate governance, security, and economic recovery. Attempts to sideline Hamas by empowering rival clans may weaken it tactically but risk deepening fragmentation and instability. Without a strong, legitimate alternative authority, Gaza is likely to remain politically volatile and militarized.
Any serious assessment of Gaza’s future after the war must begin with an unflinching recognition of what Hamas has been in Gaza: not merely a militant faction, but a ruling system embedded in society. For nearly two decades Hamas served as Gaza’s only effective governing authority, enforcing order through fear, Islamist legitimacy, and a deep administrative network rooted in Muslim Brotherhood–style institutions. That long tenure produced a political reality in which Hamas became an “institute across Gaza,” shaping culture, education, and everyday life. Consequently, the question of Gaza “after Hamas” is not only military or political—it is also social and generational.
Hamas After the War: Weakened but Not Erased
Militarily, Hamas has been badly damaged. Its command structure has suffered heavy losses; much of its tunnel and base infrastructure has been dismantled; recruitment hubs such as mosques have been hit; and its capacity to administer the Strip from inside Gaza is sharply reduced. Yet Hamas retains the ability to regenerate. The group has reportedly recruited large numbers of new fighters since October 2023, replenishing manpower even if those recruits lack the earlier professional command-and-control systems. Hamas’s ideological appeal remains durable because hostility toward Israel in Gaza is not dependent on Hamas alone; rather, Hamas has cultivated a social base that can keep it alive even without formal rule.
This produces a strategic paradox: Hamas may be too weakened to govern Gaza effectively in the short run, but still strong enough—through ideology, loyalty networks, and residual armed capability—to prevent stable alternatives from taking root.
The Limits of Disarmament and “Demilitarization”
From a doctrinal standpoint, Hamas is not structured to surrender arms. The organization’s self-identity is inseparable from jihad, martyrdom, and resistance; disarmament is framed internally as betrayal of a divine cause. Unless Hamas loses popular legitimacy for armed struggle, and unless credible paths to security guarantees and political inclusion are offered, voluntary demobilization is close to impossible. None of those enabling conditions currently exist. Hamas thus has every incentive to reorganize under another name or structure rather than dissolve.
Even if Hamas were hypothetically to accept disarmament, Gaza’s wider armed ecosystem would still remain. The Strip contains dozens of jihadist factions and clan-based militias, many of which are hostile to Israel and in some cases more extreme than Hamas. The power of guns in Gaza is not exclusive to Hamas; it is a defining feature of governance and social hierarchy. Demilitarization, therefore, is not a discrete technical step but a multi-layered conflict over authority.
Deradicalization as a Generational Challenge
The third constraint is social: Hamas is sustained by a public it helped shape. Over decades Hamas embedded religious and political indoctrination into schools, mosques, charities, youth institutions, and cultural life, producing a population in which jihadist framing became routine and institutionalized. This is particularly acute in what can be called the “Hamas Generation”—roughly 1.4 million Palestinians across Gaza and Judea and Samaria (the West Bank) born and raised under Hamas’s ideological influence. For these cohorts, Hamas is not simply a faction; it is part of the worldview they inherited.
Accordingly, deradicalizing Gaza is measured in decades, not months. It cannot be achieved only through counter-terror measures, because radicalization is tied to broader structural factors: clan authority, militia culture, unemployment, weak justice systems, political instability, and the absence of credible civic opportunity. Without improvements in security, governance, services, and economic dignity, the public will not abandon violent ideologies—regardless of who is ruling.
Israel’s Divide-and-Weaken Strategy and the Clan Question
Faced with Hamas’s resilience and the vacuum left by war, Israel has revived a divide-and-weaken strategy, backing clan-based militias opposed to Hamas. Israeli leadership has publicly acknowledged activating these clans and providing them support. The logic is straightforward: if Hamas cannot be uprooted directly, it may be contained by empowering rivals inside Gaza.
However, this strategy has severe structural risks. Clan militias are weaker, less cohesive, and less legitimate than Hamas. Many have criminal affiliations or ideological ties to extremist currents. Supporting them may fragment Gaza further, worsening the “power vacuum” rather than resolving it. The precedent is not encouraging: earlier Israeli divide-and-rule efforts against the PLO helped Hamas rise in the first place. The documents underscore the core dilemma—today’s tactical partners can become tomorrow’s strategic threats.
The Governance Deadlock
Gaza cannot stabilize without a strong, coherent, and legitimate governing authority capable of monopolizing force. Yet every plausible governance option is constrained.
- Hamas is rejected by Israel and much of the international community, but remains socially rooted and militarily adaptive.
- The Palestinian Authority is viewed by Israel as unacceptable, and by many Gazans as no more legitimate than Hamas.
- Clan militias are too fragmented and weak to govern, and may deepen lawlessness.
- External Arab or international stabilization forces are hesitant to deploy deeply, fearing entanglement with Hamas and tunnel warfare, and lacking a clear mandate accepted by locals.
Thus, Gaza sits in an unresolved triangle of problems: disarmament without political settlement is unrealistic; deradicalization without social transformation is impossible; and governance without credible sovereignty is unstable.
Gaza’s post-war trajectory will be decided less by declarations of peace plans and more by the hard realities of ideology, society, and power. Hamas is militarily weakened yet unlikely to disarm; its influence persists because it is embedded in a radicalized society and reinforced by generational continuity. Israel’s divide-and-weaken approach may disrupt Hamas tactically but risks accelerating fragmentation. Meanwhile, demilitarization and deradicalization are not single policies—they are long-term transformations requiring security, governance legitimacy, and economic reconstruction simultaneously.
In short, Gaza’s future turns on whether a non-Hamas authority can emerge that is strong enough to govern, legitimate enough to win public compliance, and capable enough to dismantle the wider militia culture that Hamas helped entrench. None of those conditions currently exist at scale. Until they do, Hamas, or its successor forms, will remain a central actor in Gaza’s political ecosystem, regardless of whether it sits formally in government.
