Seventy-one percent of Palestinians in both the Gaza Strip and the West Bank believe Hamas made the right decision in attacking Israel on October 7, according to a new poll conducted by the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research, an organization primarily funded by the European Union and the United States-based Ford Foundation.
The percentage of West Bank residents who support the Hamas attack has decreased slightly since December, when 82 percent of West Bank respondents said they agreed with the decision, though support for the terror attack has increased in Gaza, rising from 57 percent in December to 71 percent in March.
When asked whether “the war on Gaza since October 7 has revived international attention to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict that it could lead to increased recognition of Palestinian statehood,” three-quarters of respondents in the West Bank and Gaza said “yes.”
Ninety-one percent of Palestinians, according to the survey, do not think Hamas has committed war crimes, and 93 percent say the terrorist organization did not commit the well documented acts of rape and civilian slaughter that took place on October 7.
When asked who should control the Gaza Strip after the current war ends, 64 percent of respondents in the West Bank and 52 percent in Gaza said Hamas should rule the territory, whereas 13 percent chose the Palestinian Authority without president Mahmoud Abbas and 11 percent selected the PA with Abbas. Another 64 percent of respondents said they believe Hamas will defeat Israel by the time the war is over.
Seventy-five percent of Palestinians in the West Bank and 62 percent in Gaza say they are satisfied with Hamas’s role; support for Hamas within the West Bank has dropped by 10 points over the past three months, though it has risen by ten points in Gaza over the same period of time.
When asked about “the best means of achieving Palestinian goals in ending the occupation and building an independent state,” a plurality of Palestinians — 39 percent in Gaza and 46 percent in the West Bank — believe “armed struggle” to be the ideal option. To that end, a slight minority of Palestinians believe in the idea of a two-state solution and only 38 percent support negotiations to achieve such a goal.