“This is not less than in previous wars.”
It objectively is less. They gained a country from the first war and gained land in the other two wars. They gained nothing from this, and Hamas did. Sure looks a lot like defeat.
The mere fact that Hamas considers this a victory entails that they will be emboldened to do these things a lot more going forward. Deterring future attacks should have been the primary goal, and it seems like they did the opposite.
What is really telling is that Hamas’ leftist advocates abroad are even calling it a victory, because unlike Hamas itself, these are people that never want to paint the Palestinians as victors and always want to paint them as victims. To get them to change their tune implies it was a decisive Palestinian victory.