In the days after Hamas’s attack on Israel last week, everyone wondered how much Iran knew beforehand. But a focus on the specifics of the 7 October operation misses the point. The attacks just wouldn’t have been possible without Iranian support. It doesn’t matter much if they directed them.

A Hamas leader said Soleimani had given a delegation of his group $22 million in cash

The kinship between Hamas and Iran began in the nineties.