More than 3,700 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza. (File)
Doha, Qatar:
The widening conflict in Gaza has put Qatar’s hosting of a Hamas office under scrutiny and could force a reevaluation of ties between the Gulf state and the Hamas group, analysts say.
Middle East analyst Andreas Krieg, who was based in Qatar between 2013 and 2016, said Doha should “push back” on its relationship with Hamas.
“I think there is a realization that something needs to be done in terms of that relationship, depending on what the U.S. government requests,” Krieg said.
According to Israeli officials, the Hamas group attacked Israel on October 7, killing at least 1,400 people and taking another 200 hostage.
More than 3,700 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza in brutal Israeli bombings in retaliation for the attacks, according to the latest figures from the Hamas-led Health Ministry.
Qatar has been involved in intensive behind-the-scenes diplomacy and has been linked to negotiations over a prisoner exchange between Israel and Hamas due to its open channels with the Hamas group.
But while Israel has pounded Gaza with the stated aim of wiping out Hamas, Qatar’s close ally, the United States, has tried to pressure the Islamist group.
On Wednesday, Washington imposed sanctions on 10 Hamas operatives it said were involved in financing and facilitating Hamas in Gaza, Turkey and Algeria, including Ahmad ‘Abd Al-Dayim Nasrallah, a senior official based in Qatar.
– ‘Communication channel’ –
A Qatari official told AFP that Hamas’s political office “was opened in Qatar in 2012 in coordination with the US government, following a US request to open a communication channel.”
“Hamas’ political office has often been used in important mediation efforts coordinated by multiple US administrations to stabilize the situation in Gaza and Israel,” the official added.
Following the same pattern, in 2013 Qatar invited the Taliban to open a political office in Doha, with the blessing of then US President Barack Obama.
But during a visit to Qatar last week, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken warned the Gulf state about its close ties with Hamas, whose Doha office also serves as the main residence of self-exiled leader Ismail Haniyeh.
“There can be no more business as usual with Hamas,” the top US diplomat said.
Qatar has been providing financial support to the Gaza Strip for years, which officials in Doha say is “fully coordinated with Israel, the UN and the US.”
Qatar’s Prime Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani defended the Hamas office, saying it was a way “to communicate and bring peace and tranquility to the region.”
But for Krieg “there must be some kind of dissociation between Haniyeh and Qatar in the field of optics”.
He said Doha could potentially continue to host Hamas, but that “some kind of distance between the Hamas leadership and Qatari policymakers” needed to be created.
– ‘Prioritization’ –
Qatar is home to the largest US military base in the Middle East and Washington supported the small but strategic Gulf state during a four-year blockade by its neighbors led by Saudi Arabia.
“I think this is a clear prioritization of relations for Qatar,” said Middle East analyst Sanam Vakil.
“Their relationship and investment in bilateral ties with Washington will supersede all other ties the country has in the region.
“For Washington, it is also worth considering that one of its partners has the ability to channel back,” she added.
Vakil, the director of Chatham House’s Middle East program, said she expected Qatar would “take some steps” to reevaluate its association with Hamas and “over time distance itself from that relationship.”
“But it will require, and I think this is an important point, that the international community and the US have a plan to address Palestinian self-determination,” Vakil added.
Hamas’s political office was established in Qatar in the wake of the 2011 Arab Spring uprisings, amid US fears that the Palestinian group could otherwise set up a base in Iran or Lebanon, Krieg said.
Expelling Hamas leaders from Doha would now create a similar situation in which Western governments would “lose complete supervision and control over them.”
“Qatar has quite a bit of influence,” Krieg said, pointing to its role as a mediator with Iran in the prisoner swap between Washington and Tehran last month.
He said the United States “made sure that the Qataris could talk to the Iranians and explain what the different surgical options are and made sure that this didn’t blow up completely.”
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
