The near-universal assumption is that Hamas viewed its surprise offensive as another phase in a long-term war against Israel. There’s some truth to it, but that misreads why Hamas decided now to deliberately provoke a massive Israeli response—which is the long-standing power struggle between the Islamists in Hamas and their smaller ally, Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ), against the secular nationalists of Fatah who control the Palestinian Authority (PA) in the West Bank and, more importantly, the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) which represents Palestinians diplomatically.

Fatah, of course, knows this full well, but a surge of nationalist sentiment and shared outrage at the mass killing and suffering of the 2.2 million Palestinian civilians in Gaza muffled nationalist leaders like President Mahmoud Abbas (also the chairman of the PLO) in publicly acknowledging Hamas’ breathtaking cynicism.

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“Those who caused Gaza to return to living under Israeli occupation and caused a nakba [catastrophe] to befall the Palestinian people, especially in Gaza, have no right to make dictates related to national priorities,” Fatah said, batting aside Hamas’ assertion of authority. “The real side that is out of touch with reality and the Palestinian people is the Hamas leadership that has until this moment failed to realize the extent of the catastrophe endured by our oppressed people in Gaza and the rest of the Palestinian territories,” it continued, shifting quickly into a narrative framework that, for the first time in major Palestinian politics, acknowledged the full extent of Hamas’ responsibility for deliberately provoking Israel’s entirely predictable onslaught.

Fatah’s statement flung the accusation of unilateralism back at Hamas, saying the Islamists consulted with no other Palestinians before launching “an adventure on Oct. 7 that has led to a nakba that is more severe than the 1948 Nakba,”—one of the most punishing accusations in the Palestinian political lexicon.