Following the October 7 war and the documentation of the atrocities committed by Hamas against Israeli civilians, the limited political legitimacy the organization had retained within the Palestinian political system eroded dramatically. The Palestinian elections scheduled for 2026 are being held in a framework of institutional reform intended to align the Palestinian Authority with international requirements as it seeks international recognition of a future Palestinian state. One of the reform's defining features is the deliberate exclusion of Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad from the democratic process because of their status as terrorist organizations. The upcoming Palestinian elections are thus a mechanism by which to create a new source of legitimacy for the Palestinian political system—one that no longer rests on Hamas's victory in the 2006 elections but instead on an institutional framework from which the movement is excluded. Despite the public support Hamas continues to enjoy for its October 7 attack, its absence from the forthcoming elections indicates that in practical terms, the organization has lost its status as a legitimate political actor within the Palestinian arena following the war and has been relegated primarily to the role of a militant military organization operating outside the institutional political system.