The Palestinian armed group Hamas has elected Khalil al-Hayya as its new leader, according to a statement.

He replaces Yahya Sinwar, who was killed by the Israeli military in Gaza in October 2024.

Hayya, who already headed the movement in Gaza from exile, was widely seen as representing the more hardline faction that emerged from the devastating war with Israel that began almost three years ago. He was a close associate of Sinwar and is seen as continuing the political line going back to the late Ismail Haniyeh.

As the chief negotiator for Hamas, Hayya gained international prominence by leading the group’s delegations at indirect ceasefire talks, meeting mediators in Egypt and Qatar.

He had recently taken on greater responsibility for Hamas’s diplomatic and political strategies.

In September 2025, the 65-year-old survived an Israeli air strike that targeted a meeting of Hamas leaders in the Qatari capital, Doha. Five lower-level members of the group, including one of his sons, were killed along with a member of Qatar’s security forces.

Israel’s prime minister said at the time that it targeted the Hamas leaders because they had organised the attack on southern Israel on 7 October 2023, which triggered the Gaza war.

Another two of Hayya’s sons were killed in previous Israeli attempts on his life in Gaza, while a fourth was killed in an Israeli air strike in Gaza in May.

Hayya’s election as head of Hamas’s political bureau followed two rounds of voting, with members apparently split between competing visions for the future direction of the group.

The first round was inconclusive, with former political bureau chief Khaled Meshaal narrowly winning more votes than Hayya, but failing to pass the required threshold, according to a well-informed Palestinian official familiar with the election.

Under Hamas’s internal rules, a candidate must secure at least 36 votes from the 69-member electoral college to be elected outright.

It is understood that the second round run-off was decided by a first-past-the-post vote.

Hamas is going through one of the most difficult periods in its history.

The group – which is designated as a terrorist organisation by Israel, the UK, the US and many other countries – has been severely weakened by the Gaza war, during which much of its senior military and political leadership has been killed, its governing structures dismantled, and large parts of the Palestinian territory have been destroyed.

The leadership contest has exposed a widening strategic divide within Hamas over its future.

Meshaal, who previously led the movement for decades while in exile, is associated with Hamas’s traditional leadership.

His supporters have argued that Hamas should draw lessons from the war, move away from a strategy centred primarily on armed confrontation, and adopt a more pragmatic political approach while preserving the movement’s core objectives.

However, supporters of Hayya successfully argued that Gaza’s leadership, having borne the brunt of the conflict, should now lead the movement. They want to remain firm against pressure to make major concessions, particularly over the issue of disarmament.

Since it agreed a ceasefire deal with Israel last October, Hamas has refused to give up its weapons without a guaranteed political path to Palestinian self-determination and statehood. It has rejected plans from the US-led Board of Peace that prioritise immediate demilitarisation over reconstruction.

Hamas complains that there is a lack of security guarantees against continuing Israeli attacks and emerging rival armed groups.

About 1,200 people were killed and 251 others were taken hostage in the 2023 Hamas-led attack on Israel.

Israel responded by launching a massive military campaign in Gaza, during which more than 73,280 people have been killed, including 1,158 since the ceasefire began, according to the territory’s Hamas-run health ministry. (BBC)

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