[IsraelTimes] Ruling out Mashaal, analysts say slain leader’s replacement must have good relations with Shiite powers, as Hamas looks to Iran for post-war support
In choosing its next leader, the Hamas
 ..not a terrorist organization, even though it kidnaps people, holds hostages, and tries to negotiate by executing them,...
terror group will be looking for a candidate who can safeguard deep ties with Tehran, as Iranian support will be more important than ever to help the group recover after the Gazoo
...Hellhole adjunct to Israel and Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, inhabited by Gazooks. The place was acquired in the wake of the 1967 War and then presented to Paleostinian control in 2006 by Ariel Sharon, who had entered his dotage. It is currently ruled with an iron fist by Hamas with about the living conditions you'd expect. It periodically attacks the Hated Zionist Entity whenever Iran needs a ruckus created or the hard boyz get bored, getting thumped by the IDF in return. The ruling turbans then wave the bloody shirt and holler loudly about oppression and disproportionate response ...
war, analysts say.
Hamas has several potential replacements for Ismail Haniyeh
...became Prime Minister of Gaza after the legislative elections of 2006 which Hamas won. President Mahmoud Abbas dismissed Haniyeh from office on 14 June 2007 at the height of the Fatah-Hamas festivities, but Haniyeh did not acknowledge the decree and continues as the PM of Gazoo while Abbas maintains a separate PM in the West Bank...
, who was assassinated in Tehran last week in an attack widely blamed on Israel, which has neither confirmed nor denied its involvement. They include former leader Khaled Mashaal, who led Hamas for 13 years from outside the Paleostinian territories, before passing the baton to Haniyeh in 2017.
But experts believe his chances could be hurt by past friction with Shiite Iran
...a theocratic Shiite state divided among the Medes, the Persians, and the (Arab) Elamites. Formerly a fairly civilized nation ruled by a Shah, it became a victim of Islamic revolution in 1979. The nation is today noted for spontaneously taking over other countries' embassies, maintaining whorehouses run by clergymen, involvement in international drug trafficking, and financing sock puppet militias to extend the regime's influence. The word Iran is a cognate form of Aryan. The abbreviation IRGC is the same idea as Stürmabteilung (or SA). The term Supreme Guide is a the modern version form of either Duce or Führer or maybe both. They hate Jews Zionists Jews. Their economy is based on the production of oil and vitriol...
and its regional allies, notably Syrian Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad
Before going into the family business Pencilneck was an eye doctor. If he'd stuck with it he'd have had a good practice by now...
. Mashaal was Hamas leader when the group turned on Damascus during the Arab Spring and declared sympathy with the Sunni-led rebellion against him.
Iran’s support will be doubly important to Hamas as it seeks to rebuild once the guns fall silent in Gaza. The territory has been devastated by the fighting in the months since October 7 of last year, when thousands of bully boyz invaded southern Israel, killing some 1,200 people, taking 251 hostages, and sparking the ongoing war.
While Hamas continues to fight in Gaza, 10 months of pummeling by Israel have hit it hard.
This consideration seems likely to boost the prospects of candidates deemed closer to Tehran, including Khalil al-Hayya, currently serving as Hamas’s deputy leader for Gaza, though he left the territory some years ago.
"There might have been some retreat in Mashaal’s chances of taking the place of Haniyeh, because he doesn’t enjoy much support from Iran since he was the one who turned against the Syrian regime and ended the Hamas presence in Damascus," said Ashraf Abouelhoul, a specialist on Paleostinian issues and managing editor of the Egyptian state-owned paper al-Ahram.
"Also the armed wing, which is keen on the concept of rebuilding when the war is over, will be thinking of a candidate whose relations with Iran are strong enough to ensure the rebuilding takes place," he said.
One Hamas official told Rooters the succession had not been settled yet and the deliberations are underway.
HAYYA SAYS HAMAS LEADERSHIP UNITED
Hayya was known to be very close to Haniyeh. He accompanied him to Tehran for the visit during which the Hamas leader was killed in July.
Hayya led Hamas’s negotiating team for hostage-ceasefire talks under Haniyeh’s supervision and also led reconciliation talks with Hamas’s Paleostinian rival Fatah in past years.
Like Haniyeh, he maintained strong relations with Iran and in 2022, he led a Hamas delegation to Damascus to mend ties with Assad, declaring it a historic meeting.
Speaking as Hamas received condolences for Haniyeh’s death in Qatar
...an emirate on the east coast of the Arabian Peninsula. It sits on some really productive gas and oil deposits, which produces the highest per capita income in the world. They piss it all away on religion, financing the Moslem Brotherhood and several al-Qaeda affiliates. Home of nutbag holy manYusuf al-Qaradawi...
, Hayya said the movement’s leadership remained united.
"Our will is strong and can’t be broken by the martyrdom of one leader or two or three," he said. "God willing, within days, we will conclude our consultations to choose a new leader."
Hani al-Masri, a Paleostinian political analyst, said that in less extraordinary times the group’s Gaza leader, Yahya Sinwar, would have been a candidate.
A criminal mastermind of the October 7 attack, Sinwar is widely believed to still be running Hamas’s war from tunnels under Gaza.
Hayya’s chances are helped by his good ties to the Shiite terror group Hezbollah in Leb
...an Iranian satrapy currently ruled by Hassan Nasrallah situated on the eastern Mediterranean, conveniently adjacent to Israel. Formerly inhabited by hardy Phoenecian traders, its official language is now Arabic, with the usual unpleasant side effects. The Leb civil war, between 1975 and 1990, lasted a little over 145 years and produced 120,000 fatalities. The average length of a ceasefire was measured in seconds. The Lebs maintain a precarious sectarian balance among Shiites, Sunnis, and about a dozen flavors of Christians, plus Armenians, Georgians, and who knows what else? It is the home of the original Hezbollah, which periodically starts a war with the Zionist Entity, gets Beirut pounded to rubble, and then declares victory and has a parade. The Lebs have the curious habit of periodically murdering their heads of state or prime ministers...
, the region’s most powerful Iran-aligned faction, which has been trading fire with Israel throughout the Gaza war.
Masri noted Mashaal’s leadership qualities and experience, but said his prospects hinged on healing the rift with Iran: "His weak point is his negative relationships with Iran, Syria and Hezbollah at a time when there is... a joint war." 
|
