Has Iran Divorced Hamas?

Now this is interesting:

According to Haaretz, the Israeli newspaper, a group of armed Hamas fighters "brutally attacked" Shi'ite worshippers in the Gaza Strip last Friday, in part of a crackdown on Shi'ite groups that was sparked "by Hamas' fear of growing Iranian influence in Gaza." This is what happens with the Ayatollah stops paying the bills: up until a few months ago, "Iranian influence" was the sole reason for Hamas’ existence.

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So what dark turn has destroyed so fruitful a marriage of true minds? Nothing other than the imminent demise of the Assad regime in Syria.

Iran wants Hamas to hang around Damascus, currently its global headquarters, and show solidarity with the dictator who advertises himself as the last titan of Arab “resistance”. But Hamas politburo chief Khaled Meshaal has other ideas which is why, when not promising to retire, he’s been shopping for new real estate in the Middle East and shuttering all business in Damascus. As punishment for going wobbly on a regional ally, Iran has reportedly cut some or all of its funding to Hamas, forcing the group into a budgetary shortfall that’s been somewhat compensated by Turkish and Qatari funds.

But how long can this emergency subsidy last? Islamist though the current government in Ankara is, it cannot support an internationally proscribed terrorist organisation forever without jeopardising its ties to the US and Europe, not to say its Nato membership. So either Turkish money will stop flowing or Hamas will have to not just “suspend” its commitment to violence, as it claims to have done recently in order to certify a dead-letter unity deal with its secular rival Fatah – it will have to permanently renounce violence altogether.