In a close and dramatic internal vote organized by Hamas’s Shura Council, Khalil al-Hayya was elected head of the movement’s political bureau. His election was announced on July 19, 2026. Al-Hayya takes over from Yahya Sinwar, who was the movement’s last elected leader. Since Sinwar was eliminated by the IDF, the movement has been governed by a five-member council. However, these elections did not produce a decisive result: al-Hayya defeated his rival, Khaled Mashal, by a margin of just one vote, 35 to 34.
The very fact that elections were held and a decision was reached, even by a single vote, testifies to the organization’s discipline and its ability to organize and function. Yet al-Hayya’s narrow victory highlights the limited legitimacy of the ideological and strategic line he represents. While Mashal sought to restore the movement’s center of gravity to its Sunni roots and to political pragmatism, al-Hayya’s narrow victory demonstrates that the more militant Gaza-based axis, closely connected to Iran, continues to hold the reins of power, albeit by a single vote. This victory reestablishes the Gaza Strip as Hamas’s undisputed center of gravity and makes clear that despite the intense fighting, the destruction, and the military blow it has suffered, the organization’s leadership remains firmly rooted in the Gaza faction.
Who Is al-Hayya?
Khalil al-Hayya, born in the Shuja’iyya neighborhood of eastern Gaza, is a clear representative of Hamas’s founding generation. His rise through the movement spans decades of civil, political, and terrorist activity:
Al-Hayya rose alongside the movement’s early ideological architects, including Sheikh Ahmed Yassin. He took part in establishing some of the organization’s security mechanisms, was arrested, tried, and imprisoned in Israel several times, and became one of the most dominant and influential voices in the Gaza Strip. He also paid a heavy price for his activities: four of his sons were killed by the IDF during the most recent war and before it.
Al-Hayya served as a senior member of the Palestinian Legislative Council on behalf of Hamas, headed the movement’s media office, oversaw its Arab and Islamic relations portfolio, and was one of the movement’s leading negotiators in ceasefire and prisoner-exchange talks over the years.
He was among Yahya Sinwar’s closest loyalists, members of his inner circle, and confidants. The two shared a Gaza-centered worldview according to which the Gaza Strip is the movement’s center of gravity, and they maintained a rigid and uncompromising position toward Israel. Al-Hayya effectively served as Sinwar’s political and diplomatic arm outside the Gaza Strip, while maintaining full coordination and synchronization with the military command on the ground. He left the Gaza Strip before the October 7 attack, having been entrusted with the plan, with the aim of activating the political wing that Sinwar would need after the attack.
Two Schools of Terrorism
The internal elections brought to the fore an ideological-strategic and even emotional struggle between two worldviews, two regional orientations, and two distinct geographical identities within the movement:
One is the Khalil al-Hayya school, which has a distinctly pro-Iranian regional orientation. Al-Hayya views the “Axis of Resistance,” led by Tehran, as an irreplaceable source of weapons, funding, and strategic depth. The strategic concept of this school is to focus on the Gaza Strip as the primary front and command center for the fighting, and to adopt a rigid militant doctrine centered on armed resistance, or muqawama, which regards warfare as the central and most significant tool for achieving the movement’s objectives. Finally, it favors direct reliance on the military wing in Gaza and close ties with the leaderships of Iran and Hezbollah, alongside a highly critical, confrontational, and even hostile stance toward the Palestinian Authority.
This stands in contrast to the Khaled Mashal school, whose regional orientation is focused squarely on the Sunni world, relying on political and economic support and legitimacy from Qatar and Turkey.
The strategic concept of the Mashal school is diplomatic pragmatism and a willingness to engage in political maneuvering, as we saw during his tenure as the organization’s leader and as reflected in the publication of Hamas’s updated political document in May 2017. This represents an attempt to integrate into the legitimate Palestinian political system and the broader Arab system, while shifting the center of gravity toward the external leadership and the international arena.
According to this school, the political support base consists of ties with governments in the Arab-Sunni sphere and activists outside the territories, alongside a more moderate stance toward the Palestinian Authority.
Gaza versus the West Bank
Beyond the ideological dispute, these elections highlighted an original geographical divide: Khalil al-Hayya is Gazan by birth and upbringing, while Khaled Mashal is a native of the West Bank, born in Silwad, in the Ramallah Governorate.
The fact that the Gazan al-Hayya won, even if by a margin of just one vote, carries implications that reflect Hamas’s internal priorities and affect the complex relationship between the movement’s four foundational components: the Gaza Strip, the West Bank, Hamas abroad, and the prisoners.
Al-Hayya’s election entrenches the Gaza Strip as the movement’s decisive “beating heart.” While Mashal represented the potential for a rebalancing of the movement and a shift in the center of leadership toward the West Bank and Hamas abroad, al-Hayya’s victory signals to activists in the West Bank that the decision-making center remains Gazan. This could deepen feelings of alienation among the organization’s branches in the West Bank, which feel they are being forced to pay a heavy price in arrests and targeted operations because of policies planned and managed according to the interests of the Gaza arena.
As a Gazan figure closely connected to the military wing, al-Hayya will be careful to view the West Bank as a complementary front to the Gaza Strip. Under his leadership, Hamas is likely to favor pushing for military escalation and opening additional fronts against Israel, and even against the Palestinian Authority’s security forces, rather than developing civilian mechanisms.
The absence of a central leadership based in the West Bank and operating from there reduces Hamas Gaza’s ability to connect with traditional constituencies in the West Bank associated with the older institutions, and reinforces the organization’s image as a militant Gazan force seeking to drag the West Bank into a campaign that is not its own. This stands in contrast to Khaled Mashal, who is usually based in Qatar, and Zaher Jabarin, the Hamas leader in the West Bank who operates primarily from Turkey.
Committed to the Prisoners
Hamas Abroad: Al-Hayya’s election, while he is currently living outside Gaza but remains Gazan in origin, turns the external leadership into a “service conduit” for Gaza, oriented toward Gazan interests rather than an independent center of power operating in the service of Hamas’s broader and overall interests. While Mashal sought to turn the external leadership into the “head of the system,” al-Hayya views it as an executive arm responsible for managing funds in countries such as Qatar and Turkey, with diplomatic contacts serving the survival of the military wing in Gaza and the preservation of the Gaza Strip’s position as the organization’s center of gravity.
The Prisoner Current: Khalil al-Hayya, who was imprisoned three times in Israeli prisons, is strongly identified with the prisoners and is committed to their cause in the spirit of his predecessor, Yahya Sinwar. The security prisoners held in Israeli prisons, who constitute a major ideological and political power center within Hamas and have shaped many of the movement’s moves in the past, are characterized by strong ties to both geographical arenas. Accordingly, al-Hayya’s election preserves the close connection with the prisoner current and prioritizes their release in any deal, while maintaining the military wing’s hardline approach.
Unprecedented Centralization
The significance of al-Hayya’s tenure also lies in the dramatic and unprecedented concentration of authority that has fallen into his hands. For the first time in the organization’s history, a single leader simultaneously holds three critical centers of power:
- He is also the political leader, head of Hamas’s political bureau.
- He is also the chief negotiator: responsible for managing negotiations on ceasefires and hostage and prisoner deals, unless it is decided to transfer the portfolio to another Hamas figure.
- And he is also the financial conduit, with direct and exclusive control over Hamas’s bank accounts and the flow of its funds managed in Qatar and Turkey.
This threefold grip, control over finances, political affairs, and organizational matters, gives al-Hayya real enforcement capabilities over field commanders and the military wing in Gaza. In the context of diplomatic initiatives and complex diplomatic frameworks, such as the Twenty-Point Plan, the concentration of authority allows him to impose decisions, accelerate contacts, or delay them, exercising a firm hand according to his judgment.
At the same time, the slim majority he received in the elections is a double-edged sword: while he possesses the operational and financial tools to impose an agreement or thwart one, his weak internal legitimacy within the movement means that any significant concession on his part could encounter fierce opposition from the Mashal camp or from extremist elements among the field commands.
The Bottom Line
Under al-Hayya, Hamas is setting out on a clear course. His election points to adherence to the movement’s harder and more militant line, but one fraught with obstacles across three key arenas:
- In the Gaza Strip: The movement will continue its strategy of attritional warfare and guerrilla warfare. Al-Hayya will place the highest priority on the survival of the movement’s military infrastructure and will categorically reject any political or international arrangement intended to fully disarm the organization, as required by the Twenty-Point Plan, and to completely remove Hamas’s grip or presence from the governance of the Strip on the day after.
- In the West Bank: Sustained efforts will be made to escalate terrorism, shift the center of gravity of attacks toward the West Bank, and undermine the stability of the Palestinian Authority, as part of a strategy aimed at strengthening armed resistance through the “unification of fronts” and reducing the military burden on the Gaza Strip.
- Intra-Palestinian reconciliation (Fatah/Palestinian Authority): On the face of it, the prospects for reconciliation with Fatah and the Palestinian Authority are extremely low. Al-Hayya’s close ties with Tehran and his hardline militant stance preclude any realistic possibility of genuine power-sharing or the establishment of a unified and consensual Palestinian government.
In conclusion, the election of Khalil al-Hayya marks the movement’s decision in favor of continuing its militant line and its loyalty to the Iranian axis, while cementing Gaza as Hamas’s undisputed center of gravity. However, his victory over Khaled Mashal by a margin of just one vote points to a deep dispute over the movement’s direction and, in practice, leaves him at the head of a divided and complex movement. The result is that al-Hayya now stands at the helm of Hamas at its most difficult hour, wielding virtually unlimited operational and financial powers, but relying on an especially fragile political mandate.
