Narrative fail:”Iran backs Hamas, but t …

Narrative fail:

Hamas’s links with Iran may be hazier than they first seem. For a start Hamas’s exiled leaders are based in Damascus, Syria’s capital, not in Tehran. Second, much of the speculation about Hamas’s relationship with Iran has been prompted by comparisons between Israel’s current conflict in the Gaza Strip and its last war, in Lebanon in 2006, when it faced Hizbullah, another militant Islamist movement. Hizbullah, a Shia group, undoubtedly has close links with Iran, whose population is largely Shia and whose unique system of government is based on Shia Islam. Iran, alongside Syria, played a central role in the establishment of Hizbullah in the 1980s and close strategic ties persist today.

Hamas is a different creature. It emerged out of the Muslim Brotherhood, a Sunni Islamist group, and has less of a natural affinity with Iran. Whereas Iran may see in Hamas some shared revolutionary goals, and of course a shared opposition to Israel, the partnership may be one of expediency as much as a strategic alliance.