Can Hamas ever be defeated?

No matter how many times it is vanquished or decisively discredited, ‘Palestinianism’ persists as an ideology unwilling to die. Rooted in Muslim Arab nationalism, it remains fundamentally opposed to the very existence of Israel – a Jewish, liberal, and free state. Hamas, one of its most notorious champions, has in recent weeks orchestrated a carefully staged spectacle as it releases Israeli hostages from Gaza. Masked gunmen stood triumphantly, their performance captured in high resolution by cameras that had somehow survived the supposed genocide. The message was clear: this was a moment of victory, a display of strength. Never mind that Hamas had suffered catastrophic losses – its military infrastructure shattered, its leaders eliminated, its people’s homes reduced to rubble. What mattered was the illusion that they remained unbroken.

Donald Trump and Benjamin Netanyahu’s extraordinary press conference on Tuesday may signal the war’s end. But while Trump articulated a clear vision for what comes next, he has yet to outline a strategy for getting there. For now, Hamas remains in Gaza, parading hostages like trophies through the wreckage, ready to claim victory. How, then, can they ever truly be defeated? Destroying their military capabilities has not been enough. As long as their ideology endures, they can rebuild. The real challenge is not just dismantling Hamas as an organisation, but eradicating the idea that sustains it.

For 16 months, Middle East dilettantes have dismissed Israel’s military action as futile, insisting that ‘you cannot kill an idea’. Yet history suggests otherwise. Ideologies have been crushed – Nazism in Germany, imperialism in Japan – so thoroughly that they became objects of national shame. If this was possible, why does Hamas’ ideology persist?

After the second world war, Germany and Japan were not merely defeated; their belief systems were dismantled. Public trials, mass education, and historical reckoning imposed an ideological erasure. Germans were forced to confront the Holocaust. Japanese society renounced its imperialist past, with Emperor Hirohito publicly relinquishing his divine status in 1946. Shame became institutionalised, turning these ideologies into moral taboos.

But Hamas, and the broader political Islamic worldview, operates on a different foundation. For them, suffering does not provoke reflection – it reinforces their narrative of divine struggle. Death is not a failure but an honour. Humiliation does not lead to reckoning but to greater determination. Those who assumed that Hamas leaders would abandon their cause after seeing their people suffer fail to grasp a disturbing truth: for Hamas, every casualty is another step toward ultimate victory. Even the prospect of American rule in Gaza does not alter its status as Dar al-Islam (the Land of Islam), which, under their ideology, must never be ceded to non-Muslims. It must always be reclaimed by force.

This is why Hamas could stage the hostage release as a moment of pride. Immune to shame, they weaponised the event, transforming it into propaganda. Their military losses did not translate into ideological defeat. And while Hamas has proven itself impervious to collapse, the West appears determined to embrace its own. The irony is staggering: one ideology refuses to die, while another eagerly destroys itself.

Take Britain, for example – a nation that led the abolition of the slave trade, spread parliamentary democracy, and built one of the world’s most enduring legal and political systems. Yet today, expressions of national pride are met with suspicion. Marchers waving the Union Flag are often viewed as extremists, while those brandishing the PLO flag in London are labeled ‘social justice’ activists. Young Britons are encouraged to dwell on their country’s past sins rather than its achievements. The idea of Britain as a force for good is fading, replaced by a narrative of guilt and self-reproach.

Western societies have embraced the idea that shame is a necessary corrective – that confronting past injustices is the highest moral duty. In moderation, this can be healthy. Taken too far, it becomes self-destructive. Britain, like much of the West, has reached a point where its historical achievements are seen as embarrassments, its cultural identity something to be apologised for.

Hamas cannot feel shame. The West seems incapable of feeling anything else. Though early signals from Trump’s return suggest this may be changing, much of the West stubbornly drags its feet.

Ideas, like nations, do not survive by accident. They endure because they are defended – culturally, politically, and sometimes militarily. Hamas’ ideology persists because it is reinforced at every level: in schools, mosques, media, and through unwavering external support. It is constantly nourished. Meanwhile, Western ideals – free speech, democracy, national identity – are being systematically eroded from within.

A society that cannot defend its own ideas will inevitably be overtaken by those who can. Maximalist, antisemitic Palestinian leaders understand this. So do the ideological forces reshaping the West. But will Western societies realise it in time to fight back?

Can an idea be killed? History says yes. But it does not happen by accident. It requires a conscious, forceful decision to defeat, discredit, and replace what came before. If Western states recoil at the prospect of America imposing its will over Gaza, might they at least find the will to reclaim their own ideologies and societies?