That’s correct. Hamas was democratically elected in national Palestinian elections in 2006/7 that were observed by ex Pres Jimmy Carter. Moreover, Hamas had been encouraged to participate in the national election by the US administration – Bush and Rice at the time. They didn’t anticipate they would win. Hillary Clinton was also involved somehow and said that had they known they would have found a way to rig the elections. It has nothing to do with meeting a criteria of governance – they were elected in both the West Bank and Gaza and were already present at the municipal level through those elections. Hamas was one of the factions to reject the Oslo Accords and – quite correctly on the basis of both historical events and international law – refuses to acknowledge Israel as a state. The US and Israel didn’t simply have the PA push out Hamas – Haniyeh actually withdrew from being PM in order to preserve unity between PA and Hamas – the US and Israel actively forced the PA into attempting a coup and that provoked a small Palestinian civil war. In Gaza, because it’s Hamas home ground they won. The US is highly invested in promoting a completely false narrative about Palestine in general and especially Hamas. Honestly, when Iran calls the US “satanic” it’s a very good way to describe how screwed up and duplicitous the US is. And everyone goes along. Britain also has a very dark past vis a vis Palestine to hide.