[News] Hamas's Foreign Policy: Updating Daud Abdullah's analysis

[Anti-Imperialist News]

english.almayadeen.net
<https://english.almayadeen.net/articles/opinion/hamas-s-foreign-policy--updating-daud-abdullah-s-analysis>
Hamas's Foreign Policy: Updating Daud Abdullah's analysis
Hanna Eid
February 2, 2024
------------------------------

As the battle for Palestine rages on, the patient and calculated tenor of
the Axis of Resistance will provide us with a beacon toward total
liberation.
[image: ee2ce134-a699-4adb-831c-df9171368c1c.jpg]

   - The unity of the Resistance from the river to the sea is not only
   inspiring from afar, but has yielded practical results for the
   Palestinians. (Al Mayadeen English; Illustrated by Zeinab El-Hajj)

Daud Abdullah wrote an erudite and comprehensive analysis of Hamas’s
foreign policy which was released by the Afro-Middle East Center (AMEC) in
2020. The majority of the writing was done in 2019, and thus there are a
few lacunae based on the last 5 years of world affairs.

On the world scale, the Covid-19 pandemic rocked production, distribution,
and public health sectors; the Russian special military operation in
Ukraine gave us the first of a series of likely wars in the decline of
Atlanticist hegemony. In Palestine, the “Unity Intifada” -- also known as
Seif Al-Quds battle–highlighted the connectivity of the various Resistance
factions within Palestine.

Now, today, Operation Al-Aqsa Flood and its aftermath have changed the
regional geometry, with even more unity among all factions of the Axis of
Resistance across the region.

I will first analyze some of Abdullah’s policy prescriptions for Hamas
based on the world situation in 2020, and then see to what extent these
policy prescriptions have been undertaken by the Islamic movement or to
what extent they still require action. In this article, three elements of
Hamas’s foreign policy stick out to me: their relations with Russia and
China, the shifts and reconfigurations of the Axis of Resistance, and
finally, Hamas’s ability to politically and diplomatically maneuver after
October 7th.

The first topic to discuss revolves around Hamas’s relations with Russia
and China.

Abdullah’s analysis of Hamas’s relations with Russia and China is one of
the most honest, sober, and important analyses I have read in some time.
With reference to Russia, Abdullah points out that early on in Hamas’s
existence, Russia was willing to break with the iron grip of the Quartet
and defend Hamas from the ‘terrorist’ label. Hamas officials and delegates
have gone to Moscow on a number of occasions, the latest being in early
2024. At these meetings, Hamas has been treated as a regular political
party and a representative of the Palestinians, which has afforded the
movement and its leaders meetings with high-ranking officials in Russia,
such as Sergey Lavrov.

Yet, the two-headed eagle of Russia stands at a crossroads still. While
Ukraine has fallen out of the news cycle, the war is slowing down and there
have been some signals of a peace treaty in the near future. Putin–and
Russia–understand that the Ukrainian regime are puppets of the imperialists
tasked with bringing down the Eurasian superpower, yet this analysis is not
extended to “Israel”. Why is this? Is it that a great many “Israeli”
citizens are of Russian origin? Is it because Putin, like the double-headed
eagle of Russia’s standard, is balancing his role as the post-Soviet
liberal statesman and his role as the Eurasianist Hercules whose sword
hovers over the Gordian Knot of NATO imperialism? This delicate balancing
act will have to come to an end, especially with the carnage wrought by
“Israel” and the USA in Gaza today.

With reference to China, Abdullah does not spare the People’s Republic from
criticism of their position vis-a-vis Palestine and Hamas. While China–like
Russia–has from the start shielded Hamas from the ‘terrorist’ label, and
has treated Hamas as a legitimate governing party, they are involved in
their own balancing act.

China has extensive trade relations with the Zionist colony, and uses this
along with their recognition of Hamas as a means to try and enter the
region as a ‘fair and honest peace broker’. While their brokering of
rapprochement between Iran and Saudi Arabia is laudable, China is yet to
use their global clout to help isolate and sanction the Zionists. It still
clings to the dead and buried ‘two-state’ solution as their official
position.

Yet as Abdullah points out, the relationship between the more radical
Chinese intelligentsia and the Chinese state is a close one, and one which
Hamas should exploit:

As things stand, China’s intelligentsia are increasingly questioning
whether the ‘keep a low profile’ policy is fit for purpose in the
twenty-first century. In this context, Hamas has nothing to lose and
everything to gain by positioning itself to benefit from changes that seem
imminent in China’s foreign policy.

The above quote from Abdullah is one with which I agree; Chinese
intellectuals, such as Zhang Weiwei and Minqi Li, are theorizing
multipolarity and the ongoing fall of US hegemony. The Chinese
intelligentsia are also involved in President Xi’s ideological campaigns in
the PLA, which aim to politicize the army and involve them further in
socialist construction. The growing rift in Sino-US relations is an
opportunity for Hamas and the Palestinian national movement.

Hamas’s reconciliation with the Assad government in Damascus is an
important development after the two parties had differing stances on the
civil war and eventual proxy war in Syria in 2012. This subsequently
improved relations between Iran and Hamas, which had suffered after 2012 as
well. The ability of Hezbollah, and indeed Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah himself,
to orchestrate this reconciliation shows the seriousness and importance of
the Arab strategic depth.

A driving force of this reconciliation was the 2021 ‘Unity Intifada’ and
the shifts on the ground in the region which have strengthened the
Resistance. The 2021 ‘Unity Intifada’ is important for a number of reasons,
primarily that the Resistance in Gaza–the liberated land base from which
the national liberation struggle is being launched–and the Resistance in
the occupied territories went hand-in-hand into battle for the first time
since the Hamas-Fatah split in 2007.

The unity of the Resistance from the river to the sea is not only inspiring
from afar, but has yielded practical results for the Palestinians. The
internal crises of the Zionist colony highlight the contradictory trend:
while the Palestinians are uniting after years of division, the Zionists
are at each other’s throats. The unity of the Resistance and the
disintegration of social relations in the colony continue today, in the
midst of Operation Al Aqsa Flood.

Since October 7, Hamas and other Resistance factions inside Palestine
(notably PIJ, PFLP, and DFLP) have relentlessly unleashed a guerilla war on
the Zionist colony. This has not led to military victories alone; Hamas has
the potential to come out of this in a better position diplomatically. As
with all things, this depends on the balance of forces. Hamas has insisted
that the only end which they see fit in any ‘ceasefire’ is an all-for-all
prisoner swap. The magnitude of Palestinian prisoners compared to “Israeli”
ones is already a numeric victory if this is to happen, and it seems that
the Zionists may have to concede to this because their American masters are
attempting to tighten the leash. Yet, why should Hamas stop there? The
Ansar Allah forces in Sanaa have shown their willingness to disrupt global
trade in support of Palestine.

Hezbollah is showing signs of escalating battles on the northern front,
which is not an irrational fear for the Zionists given what happened in
2000 and 2006. So how could Hamas secure a larger victory? If the
Resistance is able to enfeeble the Zionists and settle a temporary truce at
the 1967 borders, that then increases the size of the land base and
improves the logistics for launching a war of total liberation because
there will be some territorial contiguity. This would also shift internal
developments in Palestine, such as the potential formation of a unity
government which gets rid of the comprador elements of Fatah. Indeed, PCPSR
polling shows that the corrupt PA is as unpopular as ever.

The potential creation of a unity government then opens diplomatic space
for powerful countries like Russia and China to support one democratic
state, which they currently do not. As the battle for Palestine rages on,
we will indeed see how Hamas’s foreign policy space waxes and wanes. As
always, the patient and calculated tenor of the Axis of Resistance will
provide us with a beacon toward total liberation.
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