Hamas and the Gazans

Hamas has ruled Gaza since 2007, when its gunmen killed hundreds of Fatah members and drove the rest out of the Strip. It rules through torture and terror. Four of its leaders — Moussa abu Marzouk, Khaled Meshaal, the late Ismail Haniyeh and the late Yahya Sinwar — have stolen a total of $14 billion from the aid money that was intended to be shared by all the Gazans. Now at last, some people in Gaza are making known to Western reporters their great unhappiness with Hamas. More on their revelations can be found here: “Beaten, hung from the ceiling: Gazans speak out against Hamas brutality – report,” Jerusalem Post, December 24, 2024:

As the war steadily continues, some Gazans are risking their safety to share their frustrations with life under Hamas and their hopes for a different future, a Sunday report by The Sunday Times revealed. To protect their safety, all names in the report have been changed.

Yasir, one of those interviewed, expressed anger at the lack of global understanding of everyday Gazans’ perspectives. “Why do others always speak for us?” he asked a sentiment echoed by others in the Times report.

He and his friend Badr are among the founders of Ekhteyar, an anonymous online platform created to provide a space for Gazans to share their thoughts. Launched in August, Ekhteyar (Arabic for “choice”) has already received contributions from over 100 people.

Yasir explained that Gazans are eager to have a platform to voice their frustrations, hopes, and fears. “We need leaders whose love for Palestine outweighs their hatred for the occupation,” one contributor wrote. Another criticized Hamas’s military tactics, arguing that “strength should be measured by the cost of conflict, not the range of rockets.”

The Times report highlights growing discontent with Hamas, which has ruled Gaza since 2007 following a violent power struggle with Fatah. Many Gazans feel trapped under its control, and polling cited by the report reflects their disillusionment. The Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research found that support for Hamas has fallen to 35% during the current conflict. Separate polling by the Tony Blair Institute suggests that only 7% of Gazans want Hamas to govern the territory after the war.

One might have expected Gazans in a time of war to rally round the Hamas flag, but little more than a third — 35% — now say they support Hamas during this war, and an astounding 93% of Gazans want some group other than Hamas to rule them after the war is over, so profound is their disaffection with the terror group.

Hicham, a construction worker in his late thirties, said his opinion of Hamas shifted drastically after the October 7 attacks on Israel. “They made a grave mistake,” he said. “They used civilian homes to fire rockets, leaving residents to face the consequences while protecting their members underground.” He added that food and resources were distributed exclusively to Hamas members while civilians starved. His father was killed during the war, and his house was destroyed in an Israeli airstrike after Hamas used it to launch rockets.

Civilians such as Hicham are understandably angry that their houses are being used by Hamas to launch rockets, for Israeli return fire damages or destroys those houses, as well as much other infrastructure in Gaza, including schools, mosques, and hospitals that Hamas has taken over and used to hide its men and weapons.

They are also furious with Hamas for seizing so much of the humanitarian aid — food and medicine — that comes into Gaza for its own members, while everyone else rest must go without Worse still, aside from what it distributes to its own members, Hamas also withholds a large amount of the aid, which is then offered it for sale, at exorbitant prices, to the general population.

Criticism of Hamas comes with significant risks. The Times report included accounts of those who posted dissenting views on social media and received threatening messages. Yasir himself was warned by a message purporting to be from Hamas’s electronic crimes unit, which read, “Reduce your Facebook comments so you don’t have to visit us.”…

Threats of unspecified harm are routinely made by Hamas to all those in Gaza who dare to criticize the group on social media.

The leading human rights organizations —such NGOs as Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International — are preoccupied with denouncing Israel for “ethnic cleansing” and “genocide” in Gaza. They insist on keeping the world focused on the Jewish state’s putative misdeeds. They don’t want to confuse people by also criticizing Hamas.

The individuals interviewed by The Times share a common aspiration: a life free from fear and oppression. “Our dream is not to die for a cause but to live with dignity,” Badr said, summing up the hopes of many Gazans who believe their voices must shape the region’s future.

Only when the IDF completes its dismantlement of Hamas — it can’t be long now — will the people of Gaza at long last be free to “live with dignity,” as was never possible as long as the terror group was in charge. There will be no more threats, or acts, of torture to keep the Gazans in line. The end of Hamas will be one more unacknowledged benefit brought to the “Palestinians” by the Jewish state.