Hamas is working to reassert itself as the dominant ruling force of the Gaza Strip despite the enactment of the US-backed deal, the Telegraph reported on Saturday.
“Every day they are making lots of progress,” said Kobi Michael, the former head of the Palestinian desk at the Strategic Affairs Ministry.
“Hamas has not changed its DNA; they do not intend to disarm themselves. They do not intend to leave the Gaza Strip and not be part of the day after.”
The example that the Telegraph gave of such progress was the storming of the Gaza Community Mental Health Program’s offices by Hamas terrorists earlier this month. The report, citing several sources, stated that armed Hamas members flooded the independent group’s offices to house their own families after they left the tunnels below Gaza.
Hamas has also been amping up public executions and beatings and has targeted opposing clans in Gaza.
Hamas tries to dominate Gaza again
The Palestinian terror group has also reportedly resumed recruiting, re-arming, and reorganizing, the report said, citing interviews with security experts on the ground and open source data.
Hamas has asked civilians to inform them when they come across unexploded munitions across Gaza, which security analysts believe the terror group could use for future fighting.
The BBC reported that Hamas has called up some 7,000 fighters to assert its control.
Since the first day of the ceasefire, images and videos online have shown Hamas’s crackdown in Gaza.
Earlier this month, videos circulated of Hamas terrorists rounding up members of the Doghmush clan and shooting them in public execution ceremonies.
Hamas also claimed a "decisive victory" against the Abu Shabab militia earlier this month.
The Radaa (deterrence) force, affiliated with Hamas's military wing, Izzadin al-Qassam Brigades, claimed to have carried out similar raids against Abu Shabab's militia several times in October, including on October 17, October 15, October 13, and October 2, according to previous SAFA reports.
Not all of these events have been independently corroborated; however, Reuters reported on clashes between Hamas-affiliated terrorists and those it has labelled as "collaborators" on October 13, noting that at least 32 Gazans had been killed by Hamas-affiliated terrorists at that time.
The brutality prompted Palestinian Authority security forces spokesman Anwar Rajab to call Hamas’s actions “ISIS-like.”
The report also stated that Hamas has reportedly gained more supplies, including SUV vehicles and weapons, from battles with Gazan clans.
Though US President Donald Trump has threatened to “obliterate” Hamas, Israeli analysts say that the terror group does not believe his threats.
“I don’t think they take it too seriously because they understand President Trump,” Michael said.
“They see that he is mainly interested in the first phase, the end of the war, and he will leave the details of the second and third stages to the professionals, to the clerks.”
Michael added that he believes that Trump would want to de-escalate fighting in Gaza, but would be more relaxed about what disarming really looks like on the ground.
He added that because Trump could be more interested in regional alliances in the Middle East, he will therefore force Israel to accept a reality where Hamas does not meaningfully disarm.
“Hamas has achieved a degree of fear, a deterrence effect,” Gazan political analyst Ahmed Fouad Alkhatib told the Misgav Institute podcast.
“They’re saying ‘look, we’ve spent two years in tunnels. We’ve spent two years fighting Israel, but we are still here. We are not going to disarm; we’re not going to accept an international stabilization force. You [the civilians] are our hostages now.’”
“Now that they have given up the living hostages, the only bargaining chips that Hamas has are its dominion and control over the two million Palestinians who still live in the Gaza Strip,” he added.
Seth J. Frantzman contributed to this report.