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Hamas leader: 'Sudan has never failed us'

Hamas is investing in Iranian support as it scrambles to reset its strategy as a result of the latest normalization agreements with Israel in the region.

Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh (C) meets with Egyptian Cleric and chairman of the International Union of Muslim Scholars Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi (L) and former Sudanese president Abdel Rahman Swar Al Dahab (R) after their arrival in Gaza City on May 9, 2013. Al-Qaradawi arrived on May 8, 2013 for his first visit to Gaza Strip with a delegation of Muslim scholars. AFP PHOTO /MOHAMMED ABED        (Photo credit should read MOHAMMED ABED/AFP via Getty Images)
Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh (C) meets with Egyptian cleric and Chairman of the International Union of Muslim Scholars Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi (L) and former Sudanese President Abdel Rahman Swar Al Dahab (R) after their arrival in Gaza City, Gaza Strip, May 9, 2013. — MOHAMMED ABED/AFP via Getty Images

As the United States and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) look to Sudan as possibly the next Arab country to sign a normalization agreement with Israel, Hamas is hoping that Khartoum will stay true to its support for the Palestinians. 

The United States is presently negotiating Sudan’s removal from its designation as a foreign terrorist organization.

Sudan’s designation as a state sponsor of terrorist groups dates back to when Osama bin Laden set up shop there in the late 1990s, leading to US attacks on al-Qaeda assets in 1998. In those days, Sudan also emerged as one of the few friends of the Palestinian Islamic Resistance Movement, or Hamas.

From the outset of its founding in 1987, Hamas’ ideological links to the Muslim Brotherhood gave it access to the widespread organization’s network across both the Arab and Muslim world. Its launching was to many Islamists in the region a dream come true, given the fact that the Palestinian resistance movement had been dominated by leftists and seculars who gave the struggle a nonreligious narrative and posed a barrage of accusations to the Palestinian Islamic movement in regard to its commitment to the cause.

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