Though Hamas’s popularity has declined among Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza, Hamas leader Khalil al-Hayya still commands more support than Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, according to a new poll published by the Ramallah-based Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research on Wednesday.

The survey was conducted among 1,270 Palestinians between August 5 and 8, with 830 respondents in the West Bank and 440 in the Gaza Strip. Researchers conducted face-to-face interviews using tablets or mobile phones, with the data automatically transmitted to the research center’s server to prevent interception or manipulation. The poll had a margin of error of 3.5%.

The most popular candidate for Palestinian leadership was Fatah figure Marwan Barghouti, who is currently imprisoned in Israel and played a key role in the Second Intifada, with 54% of likely voters saying they would vote for him in a hypothetical presidential election. Al-Hayya would receive just over a quarter of the votes, 26%, and the current Palestinian Authority president would receive only 14%, according to the poll. Notably, only 10 months ago, 36% of respondents said they would support Hamas figure Khaled Meshaal, showing a drop in support by 10%.

Satisfaction with Abbas’s performance as president stands at just 20%, down slightly from 23% ten months ago, while 76% of Palestinians expressed dissatisfaction, according to the poll. Satisfaction was higher in the Gaza Strip, at 26%, than in the West Bank, where just 16% approved of his performance. The large majority, 82% in the West Bank and 74% in the Gaza Strip, want to see Abbas’s resignation.

Likely connected to Abbas’s lack of popularity, 83% of respondents said that they believed that there is corruption in PA institutions and 65% said they view the PA as a burden for Palestinians.

Despite more than half expressing support for Barghouti, 40% said they would not participate in the presidential elections.

Election turnout could be high if factions from the 2006 vote participate in today’s elections

However, if legislative elections were held in which all electoral lists or factions that participated in the 2006 elections competed, turnout would be 66%.

Fatah would receive 32% of the votes in the legislative elections, according to the poll, followed by Hamas at a close 29%.

However, among Gazan respondents alone, Hamas would receive 34%, Fatah 30%, and the combined third parties 27%.

Though more than a quarter of respondents maintained their position in favor of Hamas, the poll showed a significant decline in support for the terrorist group. Just 10 months ago, 44% of respondents overall said they would vote for Hamas, and support in Gaza specifically stood at 49%.

When asked which political party or political orientation they supported, 24% said they preferred Fatah, and 24% answered that they preferred Hamas; 14% chose third parties, and 38% said they supported none of them or did not know.

Continuing to demonstrate a trend in declining support for Hamas, ten months ago, 35% said they supported Hamas, including 41% in Gaza, but the figure now stands at only 18% in the West Bank and 33% in Gaza.

Though the survey did not seek to determine if, when, or why respondents’ views of Hamas had changed, it found that only 20% believed Hamas emerged victorious from the war against Israel. A majority, 60%, said neither side won, while 15% said Israel emerged victorious. In the Gaza Strip, 20% said Hamas won, while an identical 20% said Israel emerged victorious.

The proportion of respondents who believed Hamas had won the war nearly halved from 39% in October 2025. The decline was particularly pronounced in the West Bank, where just 21% now believe Hamas emerged victorious, down from 48% ten months ago.

Not as popular as it once was, 72% of respondents were still against Hamas disarming before a complete Israeli withdrawal from the Gaza Strip. Only 20% of respondents felt Hamas should disarm first. Palestinians living in the Gaza Strip were slightly more in favor of Hamas disarming first, with 62% opposed, compared to the West Bank where 79% insisted Israeli presence must first be removed.

Respondents believe war would resume if Hamas disarmed, Israel would not withdraw from Gaza

An overwhelming majority, 72%, said they believed that if Hamas were to disarm, the war in Gaza would resume and Israel would not fully withdraw from the Gaza Strip. Only 22% believed that Hamas’s disarmement would not be the cause of a continued war.  

One in five respondents said they believed a full-scale war would resume, while only 30% believed Gaza would move toward a period of peace and stability. Another 41% said they expected the current situation, marked by occasional Israeli strikes, to continue.

Support for a two-state solution has remained largely unchanged over the past 10 months, with 44% of respondents in favor, down 1 percentage point from October, while 50% opposed the proposal, according to the poll. Some 58% said that the two-state solution is no longer practical because of settlement expansion, while 36% answered that they believe that it remains practical. Similarly, 64% say that the chances of establishing an independent Palestinian state alongside Israel within the next five years are low or nonexistent, while 32% say that the chances are medium or high.  With the two-state solution being a divisive issue among Palestinians, 36% said they supported the alternative of returning to confrontations and armed intifada, and 33% said they supported a single Palestinian state.

More than half (53%) also said they believed that even if Hamas gave up its weapons, it would remain an “armed resistance movement” and a political movement, while only 36% believed it would focus solely on politics.

Trust in the US-backed alternative to Hamas, the Board of Peace, was low but was considered a viable political option, the survey found. If the Palestinian elections scheduled for November are held as planned and a new government is formed, 32% (43% in Gaza and 24% in the West Bank) would prefer that NCAG maintain responsibility for the Gaza Strip over the elected government. Only 28% (34% in Gaza and 24% in the West Bank) would prefer a newly elected government to assume responsibility for the administration of Gaza, while 34% do not prefer either option.

Asked their opinion of external actors, the Iran-aligned Houthi terror group was highly popular among respondents in both the Gaza Strip and the West Bank. The majority, 61% (63% in the West Bank and 58% in Gaza), said they were satisfied with the Houthis.

Qatar (51%), Hezbollah (50%) and Iran (50%) were also popular among Palestinian respondents, though satisfaction with Iran has grown over the past 10 months and Doha’s popularity has slightly declined since the last survey.

When asked whether they were with or against Iran during the recent war between the United States and Iran, which resulted in the closure of the Strait of Hormuz and retaliatory attacks against US bases in the region, 45% of respondents said that they were with Iran, 12% answered that they were against Iran, and 40% said that they were neither with Iran nor with the United States.

This post was originally published on here.