Summary
Qatar is a key external enabler of Hamas, providing political shelter, financial channels, and ideological support while publicly denying involvement in terrorism.
Hamas leadership used Qatar as a base for long-term strategic planning, including preparations for the October 7, 2023 attack and broader efforts to eliminate Israel.
In parallel, Qatar-backed clerical networks and charitable and humanitarian frameworks reinforced Hamas’s military, governance, and ideological infrastructure, helping legitimize violence religiously and sustain the organization’s operational capacity.
- Qatar as Hamas’s primary external enabler: Over two decades, Qatar provided Hamas with political sanctuary, legitimacy, funding channels, and diplomatic cover, hosting its leadership and enabling strategic planning despite public denials of supporting terrorism.
- Strategic and military preparation for Israel’s destruction: From at least 2014 onward, Hamas leadership developed a long-term, genocidal strategy aimed at eliminating Israel, expanding military capabilities and planning a multi-front assault that closely resembled the October 7, 2023 attack.
- Ideological and religious legitimization of violence: Qatar-hosted and Qatar-supported clerical networks linked to the Muslim Brotherhood framed jihad against Israel as a religious obligation, endorsed mass violence against Jewish civilians, and later issued charters justifying October 7 and calling for global mobilization.
- Aid diversion and institutional entrenchment of Hamas: Qatari-funded charities, cash assistance, and support for UNRWA in Gaza simultaneously provide humanitarian aid while reinforcing Hamas’s governance, military infrastructure, and control over civilian institutions.
- Globalization of Hamas’s terrorist activity: Intelligence claims Hamas leadership based in Qatar directed or facilitated terrorist infrastructure beyond Gaza, including in Europe, underscoring Qatar’s role in enabling Hamas’s regional and international reach rather than acting as a neutral mediator.
Qatar has served as a central political, financial, and ideological enabler of Hamas over the past two decades, despite repeatedly denying that it supports Hamas’s terrorist infrastructure. Hamas leadership regarded Qatar as its most reliable regional ally—more dependable than Egypt—because Doha provided sustained access, legitimacy, funding channels, and diplomatic cover even as Hamas openly planned a war aimed at eliminating the State of Israel.
Qatar and Hamas: Political Shelter and Strategic Depth
Hamas leaders operated for years from Qatar, which hosted the movement’s political leadership and facilitated its external activity. This presence was publicly justified by Qatari officials as a mediation role allegedly requested by the United States, intended to maintain communication with a non-state actor to facilitate ceasefires, humanitarian access, and hostage negotiations. Qatar maintains that all aid sent to Gaza was transparent and coordinated with Israel and international actors, and that no Qatari funds were directed to Hamas’s military wing.
However, intelligence material cited here asserts that Qatar was uniquely positioned as the only actor with influence over both Hamas’s political leadership abroad and its military command in Gaza. From this vantage point, Hamas leadership allegedly used Qatar as a base for strategic deliberations, long-term military planning, and coordination with Iran and its regional proxy network.
Long-term Planning for Israel’s Destruction
As early as 2014, Hamas leadership articulated a comprehensive plan known as the “Promise of the Hereafter Battle,” framed as a final confrontation intended to destroy Israel and reshape the Middle East. This concept was accompanied by ideological preparation, institutional development, and detailed military planning. Hamas leaders openly described the conflict as existential and religious in nature, not territorial or negotiable.
By 2016, senior Hamas figures—both from Gaza and from the external leadership—were reportedly convening to formalize a “Liberation Strategy” that envisioned the elimination of Israel within a defined timeframe. These discussions coincided with a period in which Hamas dramatically expanded its military capabilities: establishing a domestic weapons manufacturing industry, constructing hundreds of kilometers of tunnels, training elite assault units, and preparing for a large-scale, multi-front attack.
Israeli leaders later publicly described Hamas’s operational concept in detail: massive rocket fire on Israeli cities; simultaneous infiltration by land, sea, air, and tunnel; the use of elite forces to seize Israeli communities; and mass hostage-taking to shatter Israeli morale. This operational blueprint closely matched the tactics ultimately employed on October 7, 2023.
Genocidal Ideology and Post-Israel Governance Planning
Hamas leaders and allied figures framed the “Promise of the Hereafter” not merely as a military campaign, but as a civilizational project. Conferences and public statements discussed governance structures, land redistribution, and property transfer in a future Palestine from which Israel would no longer exist. Jewish presence in the land was depicted as temporary and illegitimate, with some Hamas-aligned figures predicting or advocating for mass Jewish flight, expulsion, or evacuation during or after the conflict.
This rhetoric, grounded in selective religious and historical claims, presented the removal of Israel as both inevitable and divinely sanctioned. Violence against Jewish civilians was framed not as collateral damage but as an integral component of liberation.
Qatar-Backed Clerical Networks and Religious Legitimization
Beyond its relationship with Hamas directly, Qatar has long supported or hosted influential Islamist clerical bodies, most prominently the International Union of Muslim Scholars (IUMS), founded in Doha and historically led by Yusuf al-Qaradawi. This organization, aligned with the Muslim Brotherhood, brought together senior Sunni religious figures with broad spiritual authority across the Islamic world.
IUMS and affiliated bodies repeatedly issued statements framing jihad against Israel as a religious obligation, rejecting peace agreements, normalization, or any prohibition on armed struggle. Financial support for “resistance” was defined as a form of religious duty. After October 7, 2023, these organizations praised the attackers as heroic “mujahideen” and called on Muslim governments, clerics, media, academics, and private donors to support the fight through material, political, and informational means.
Subsequent religious rulings expanded this position, declaring that Muslim states were obligated to wage jihad against Israel and to provide weapons, intelligence, and logistical support to armed groups. These declarations were accompanied by repeated high-level engagement between Qatari officials and the leadership of these clerical bodies, reinforcing the perception of state tolerance or endorsement.
Hamas-Affiliated Scholars and Incitement
Hamas-linked religious organizations—including the Palestine Scholars Association and the League of Palestinian Scholars—operated in close coordination with the clerical networks based in Doha. Their leaders issued statements portraying all of Palestine as Islamic land “until the Day of Judgment,” defining Jews and other non-Muslims residing there as combatants by default.
Following the October 7 attack, senior Hamas-affiliated clerics publicly called for mass violence against Jews in Israel and abroad, urging Muslims to attack wherever possible and to treat normalization with Israel as a legitimate target. These statements framed the conflict as global, not confined to Gaza or Israel.
A Comprehensive Religious Charter Endorsing October 7
In 2025, a coalition of clerics associated with Hamas and the broader Muslim Brotherhood ecosystem issued a detailed charter providing religious legitimacy for the October 7 attack and outlining obligations for Muslims worldwide. The charter declared Israel illegitimate, rejected international law and peace agreements, and described armed jihad as an unconditional duty.
The document characterized the October 7 attack as defensive jihad that required no approval from rulers and justified the enormous civilian toll in Gaza as a righteous and divinely rewarded sacrifice. It condemned any calls to disarm Hamas as treason against God and instructed societies to prepare future generations for jihad through education, media, lawfare, and financial support.
Hamas-Directed Terrorism in Europe
Information attributed to Israeli intelligence services asserts that Hamas leadership based in Qatar was involved in authorizing or facilitating terrorist infrastructure in Europe. One case cited involved the discovery of weapons and explosives in Vienna, allegedly linked to a Hamas operative with close familial and organizational ties to senior Hamas leaders abroad. Meetings in Qatar were described as evidence of centralized direction rather than rogue activity, contradicting Hamas’s public denials.
Charities, Aid Diversion, and Hamas Governance
Qatari-funded charitable organizations operating in Gaza are depicted as playing a dual role: providing genuine humanitarian assistance while simultaneously serving Hamas’s governance and military apparatus. Internal Hamas documents are cited as evidence that funds and resources from charities were redirected to support fighters, compensate operatives, finance infrastructure, and sustain logistical operations.
Publicly, these charities emphasized Qatar’s generosity, highlighting housing projects, food distribution, mosque construction, cemeteries, and cash assistance. Privately, according to the documents presented, Hamas leveraged its control over Gaza’s institutions to channel resources toward its military wing.
Palestinian Authority Objections
The Palestinian Authority formally objected to Qatar’s cash assistance program in Gaza, arguing that coordination with Hamas-run ministries legitimized Hamas’s rule and deepened Palestinian political division. The PA warned that such arrangements effectively amounted to cooperation with Hamas and helped entrench its control over Gaza’s civilian administration, which Hamas itself acknowledged was instrumental in building its military power.
UNRWA Funding and Militant Penetration
Qatar is a major donor to UNRWA, transferring roughly $200 million over several years. UNRWA is portrayed here as deeply compromised by Hamas influence in Gaza. Reports describe Hamas operatives employed by UNRWA, the use of UNRWA facilities for weapons storage, command centers, and tunnel infrastructure, and participation by some UNRWA staff in the October 7 attack.
Israeli military operations after October 7 uncovered extensive evidence of Hamas exploitation of UNRWA schools, clinics, and headquarters, including tunnels, weapons caches, intelligence equipment, and active combat operations conducted from or near humanitarian sites. Intelligence assessments further alleged that a significant portion of UNRWA’s Gaza workforce had direct or familial ties to terrorist organizations.
Overall Picture
Qatar is not a neutral mediator but rather a state that provided Hamas with political sanctuary, financial lifelines, ideological reinforcement, and global reach. Through hosting Hamas leadership, sustaining aid flows that bolstered Hamas governance, and supporting clerical networks that sanctified violence and genocide, Qatar enabled Hamas’s transformation into a heavily armed, ideologically driven organization capable of carrying out the October 7 attack and seeking to expand its terror campaign beyond the region.
