Hamas gives up Gaza government, but not Iran ties
Negar Mojtahedi
Iran International
Hamas says it is stepping away from governing Gaza. But is it actually giving up power or turning away from its longtime backers in Tehran?
Iran International
Hamas says it is stepping away from governing Gaza. But is it actually giving up power or turning away from its longtime backers in Tehran?
The group’s announcement that it is dissolving the governing body that administered Gaza for nearly two decades has been presented as a significant political concession under a US-backed roadmap for the enclave’s future.
But analysts who spoke to Iran International say the move is largely cosmetic, leaving Hamas’s military structure intact and doing little to alter its long-standing relationship with Iran.
Rather than abandoning Hamas, Iran has simply shifted its priorities, they argue, placing Hezbollah and Lebanon ahead of Gaza while quietly maintaining ties with the group.
"It's not even symbolic, it's a lie," said Beni Sabti, an Iran researcher at the Institute for National Security Studies (INSS). "The real thing is not even the disarmament. The ideology is still there."
The announcement dissolves Hamas’s civilian governing body, but leaves unanswered whether the group is willing to surrender its weapons and relinquish control over Gaza’s security apparatus.
For Sabti, that omission is the entire story.
"Iran is acting behind the curtains, also for Hamas," he said.
Recent developments suggest the relationship remains active despite Tehran’s muted public rhetoric.
Before the Iran-US memorandum was signed, a Hamas military spokesman said Iranian officials had pledged to help secure a ceasefire in Gaza.
Hamas representatives also traveled to Tehran for Ali Khamenei’s funeral, where they met senior Iranian officials, including Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf.
To Sabti, those contacts suggest Tehran has not changed its long-term strategy. Instead, it has temporarily reordered its priorities.
"Hezbollah is the most important," he said, arguing Iran has historically never abandoned its proxy groups.
The timing of Hamas’s announcement also reflects mounting pressure on the group.
It comes amid a US-backed political process for Gaza’s future, sustained pressure from Egypt and Qatar, renewed political competition from Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and growing anti-Hamas protests inside Gaza itself.
Dalia Ziada, a Middle East analyst with ISGAP, argues Hamas’s announcement was designed to respond to those pressures without making the one concession demanded by Israel and much of the international community.
"They were forced to say something, not to do something," she said.
According to Ziada, Hamas has not agreed to disarm, dismantle its military wing or remove the network of loyalists embedded throughout Gaza’s civilian institutions.
"The international community is dealing with Hamas as a political entity," she said. "But no. This is a terrorist militia."
Ziada believes Tehran’s current restraint reflects pragmatism rather than a strategic break.
"Hamas is not profitable anymore," she said, arguing the group has become more of a liability than an asset following Israel’s campaign against its leadership. "If Hamas survives this situation... of course Iran will snap back."
Former Israeli intelligence official Avi Melamed agrees Hamas’s announcement should not be mistaken for a genuine transfer of power.
"I don't think that anyone really takes it seriously," he said.
Melamed argues Iran views Hamas primarily as a strategic instrument rather than an ideological partner.
"The relationship has been always clear. Hamas is a useful servant for the Iranian regime."
For Tehran, he says, Hezbollah remains the crown jewel of its regional network, while Hamas occupies a lower place in what he describes as the "food chain."
"Hamas and Islamic Jihad know their place in the food chain," Melamed said.
That hierarchy helps explain why Lebanon featured prominently in the Iran-US memorandum while Gaza did not.
The announcement may ease diplomatic pressure and create space for negotiations over Gaza’s future. But without disarmament, analysts argue, it changes little about the balance of power on the ground.
Hamas may be stepping away from civilian administration. Its military structure remains intact. And despite Tehran’s public silence, few expect Iran’s relationship with Hamas to disappear.
"As far as I'm concerned, it's over," Trump told reporters in Ankara before a NATO summit.
"I don't want to deal with them anymore. They're scum... they're sick people, they're led by sick people, and they're vicious, violent people."
Trump said he would allow US negotiators to continue talks if they wished but signaled he no longer believed diplomacy would succeed.
"They want to negotiate. They're good people... but they have to come back to me," he said. "As far as I'm concerned, it's just a waste of time dealing with them, they're liars."
Last month, Washington and Tehran had signed a memorandum of understanding setting out a framework to end the conflict, including steps toward a ceasefire and renewed talks over Iran's nuclear program.
Trump defends overnight strikes
Trump defended US strikes carried out overnight, saying they came after Iran launched missiles at ships a day earlier.
"We hit them very hard last night, very hard," he said. "I told them every time you hit, we hit."
He said Iran targeted commercial shipping after Washington had allowed time for funeral ceremonies for supreme leader Ali Khamenei following earlier fighting.
"We said, 'Go and do your funeral stuff,' and instead of that they start shooting rockets at ships yesterday."
'We're going to denuke it'
Trump repeated that Iran could never be allowed to obtain a nuclear weapon.
"They can't have a nuclear weapon," he said. "We're going to denuke it. We're not going to let them."
He said Iran killed US troops through proxy attacks and blamed former Iranian military commander Qassem Soleimani for supplying roadside bombs that killed American soldiers.
"They've killed thousands and thousands of our soldiers," Trump said. "They've killed hundreds of thousands of innocent people."
Trump also said Iran had sought to kill him.
"I saw things this morning. I'm on every single one of their lists," he said. "So far I guess I've been lucky."
He described Iran's leaders as "evil, sick people" and compared the country to "cancer."
"You've got to cut out cancer early."
'They killed 54,000 people'
Trump also said Iran's authorities killed thousands of protesters during anti-establishment demonstrations.
"They killed 54,000 people as of now that were protesting," he said.
"When people say, 'How come they haven't taken over?' They can't take over because they're dead."
He also added that Iran repeatedly breaks agreements.
"We make a deal... everyone's agreed, no nuclear weapon... they go outside, talk to the press, they say we never even talked about it," Trump said.
"There's something wrong with them. They're cuckoo."
Criticizes NATO allies
Trump also renewed criticism of NATO, saying several allies refused to support the United States during the conflict with Iran.
He said Britain, Germany and France declined requests to assist Washington during the fighting.
"They said, 'We don't want to help you now, but we'll help you when the war is over,'" Trump said.
He said the United States had been "treated unfairly" by NATO and paid "billions and billions of dollars too much" for the alliance's defense.
Trump also repeated criticism of Spain, calling it "a terrible partner in NATO" and saying he wanted to end US trade with the country.
The remarks came after the United States carried out a new wave of strikes on military targets in Iran in response to attacks on commercial shipping in the Strait of Hormuz. Iran later launched missile and drone attacks on US military sites in Bahrain and Kuwait, further eroding the memorandum signed earlier this week to halt the fighting.
Iranians frustrated with years of one-sided, hardline coverage by the Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting, or IRIB, are increasingly watching the possible leadership change as an early sign of whether the system intends to correct course.
Radical anti-diplomacy factions have long used IRIB, whose chief is directly appointed by the supreme leader, to undermine pragmatist efforts toward a breakthrough with Washington.
That pressure continued even during the weeklong funeral ceremonies for former Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, when hardline voices on state television kept attacking attempts to shift the country away from wartime confrontation.
As Jebelli’s five-year term nears its end, criticism of his tenure and his ultraconservative Paydari Party allies has moved from reformist circles into more mainstream political commentary.
Jebelli and his cultural deputy Vahid Jalili, the brother of senior conservative politician Saeed Jalili, are widely regarded by critics as key figures behind IRIB’s hardline editorial line, particularly its hostility toward the government’s diplomatic and postwar agenda.
Many Iranians and media analysts now view a possible shakeup at the broadcaster as a signal of whether Iran’s new leadership is willing to curb unilateral rhetoric and restore a degree of institutional balance to state media.
A commentary on the moderate news site Asr-e Iran, headlined “Countdown to the Start of Changes in the IRIB,” said the political fallout over the broadcaster’s recent censorship of Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf had reached senior levels of the establishment.
According to the report, the incident is no longer being treated as a routine editorial or executive mistake, but as a threat to national security and internal cohesion at a sensitive moment of postwar realignment.
The outlet said a political “countdown” had begun behind closed doors, pointing to a possible restructuring aimed at ending radical factions’ grip over the state’s most powerful media platform.
Asr-e Iran argued that IRIB had crossed a major political red line by turning a partisan media dispute into a broader governance crisis. It said a publicly funded broadcaster could not be allowed to become “the private clubhouse of an extremist faction” defying what it described as the official consensus of the governing branches.
The commentary said the current management model at IRIB had become an internal obstacle to the state’s strategic direction and called for a purge of the broadcaster’s leadership.
'IRIB deepens state-society divide'
Earlier this week, the pro-reform daily Arman-e Melli also described IRIB’s abrupt censorship of relatively moderate figures, including Ghalibaf, as evidence of a deeper institutional crisis within Iran’s political elite.
The paper accused IRIB’s leadership of being “hijacked by a narrow, radical faction allied with hardline rejectionists” and said the broadcaster was using public media to suppress even official state narratives when they conflicted with factional interests.
By censoring the head of the legislative branch at a time when he is seeking to move the country from wartime footing toward economic reconstruction, the daily argued, IRIB had openly damaged the appearance of internal unity.
Arman-e Melli said the broadcaster had deepened the divide between the state and society and shown that it could not tolerate even the official narrative of a conservative parliament speaker.
In a separate commentary in the same paper, reformist figure Hassan Rasouli offered a broader critique of factional infighting, arguing that public dissent by hardline elements weakens the state’s leverage in international negotiations.
Rasouli called for a temporary freeze on factional rivalry, saying domestic media platforms should serve as pillars of administrative cohesion during a critical geopolitical transition. He argued that projecting strategic stability abroad requires protecting the executive branch from internal sabotage at home.
The debate over IRIB comes as Iran’s new leadership faces growing scrutiny over whether promised or anticipated institutional changes will materialize.
Earlier this week, Judiciary Chief Gholamhossein Mohseni Ejei was reinstated, disappointing many Iranians, particularly human rights advocates who had hoped for change.
If Jebelli and his team are also reinstated at IRIB, public frustration is likely to deepen and reinforce the perception that the system remains unwilling to reform its most unilateral and hardline institutions.
The United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations (UKMTO) later listed three tanker attacks near the Strait of Hormuz on Tuesday, including an LNG tanker hit by an unknown projectile eight nautical miles east of Limah, Oman, causing a fire in its port-side engine room.
The advisory also listed a VLCC hit east of Khor Fakkan, UAE, with no crew injuries reported, and a third tanker struck east of Oman’s Musandam Peninsula, sustaining minor structural damage with no casualties or environmental impact reported.
Maritime security sources said a Saudi-flagged crude oil tanker was among the vessels damaged close to the coast of Oman on Tuesday and was believed to be the Wedyan supertanker.
US officials told Axios and The Wall Street Journal that Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps fired missiles at two commercial ships transiting the Strait of Hormuz. Both vessels, the officials said, sustained significant damage but there were no reported casualties.
Iranian state television offered a different account, reporting that one tanker had ignored repeated warnings while using a maritime route near the Omani coast backed by the United States. The tanker, it said, was struck after failing to heed those warnings.
One of the targeted vessels appeared to be Al Rekayyat, a liquefied natural gas tanker linked to Qatar's LNG industry, according to The Wall Street Journal. Marine radio recordings cited by the newspaper indicated the ship suffered a fire near its engine room but that all crew members were safe.
Talks lose momentum
The attacks came less than three weeks after Tehran and Washington signed a memorandum of understanding under which Iran agreed to halt attacks on shipping in the Strait of Hormuz during negotiations over a broader agreement. A separate one-week arrangement aimed at preventing attacks in the waterway has since expired.
Indirect talks in Doha last week ended without significant progress on maritime security, according to US officials.
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said Tuesday that negotiations on a final agreement would not begin while threats against Iran continued, urging Washington to "honor your signature" under the memorandum of understanding.
Separately, senior Iranian lawmaker Alaeddin Boroujerdi said legislation to formalize Iran's management of the Strait of Hormuz would be introduced in parliament, adding that any arrangement concerning the waterway without coordination with Tehran was "doomed to fail."
The reported attacks unfolded during the fifth day of funeral ceremonies for former Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, showing the fragility of efforts to stabilize one of the world's busiest energy shipping corridors.
