With his re-election to another four-year term, Khaled Meshaal completes 17 years as the Hamas movement’s leader. He became chairman of Hamas’ political bureau in 1996, before reaching 40. He was then a young man overwhelmed by the decision-makers in the region and most Hamas members. Today he is 55 and seeks to reach the status of Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, the movement’s founder. He constantly has meetings and holds interviews with local, regional and international decision-makers.

The above introduction may provide clues about the agenda Abu al-Walid — as he likes to be called — in his new term and the internal and external challenges that he will be facing.

Hamas’ internal house

Meshaal knows more than others that his re-election did not happen without reservations from some Hamas leaders, especially the high-ranking ones who were competing for the post, such as Moussa Abu Marzouk, 62, who lives abroad. For the past 16 years, Abu Marzouk has sought to restore what he saw as his “rightful place” as the movement’s leader because Meshaal reached that post only after Marzouk was arrested in the United States in 1996.