If not Hamas, then who: The terrorist group remains a dominant force in the Gaza Strip

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No medical care and no food

The humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip remains extremely dire, with each side continuing to blame the other. Despite the truce that has been in place for several weeks, medical equipment, medicines, and even food continue to reach the enclave in minimal quantities. After three years of war, Gaza’s healthcare system is in tatters, with basic care like insulin injections becoming an almost unattainable luxury due to the shortage of medicine and the lack of qualified medical personnel.

The situation is even worse for illnesses requiring more advanced treatment. According to the non-governmental Palestinian Medical Relief Society, around 40% of Gazans who require regular hemodialysis for kidney disease have died due to the unavailability of the procedure — unsurprising given that the enclave’s only dialysis center was destroyed during the hostilities.

According to Palestinian NGOs, the Israeli government, which continues to control all of the Strip’s borders, has rejected dozens of requests to deliver humanitarian aid to Gaza. Their data indicate that during the first ten days of the truce, fewer than 1,000 trucks carrying food, medicine, tents, and other basic assistance entered the enclave — instead of the planned 6,600.

Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors Without Borders) describes the situation in the region as a humanitarian catastrophe, placing full responsibility on the Israeli army and government. According to the French organization, 67,000 Palestinians have died as a result of the fighting in Gaza, 169,000 have been injured, and over 44,000 children have been left orphaned.

In turn, Israel continues to blame Hamas for impeding the delivery of humanitarian aid. According to Israeli intelligence, the terrorist organization is blocking agreed-upon supply routes, attacking trucks, and even infiltrating international charitable organizations, where its operatives carry out acts of sabotage and diversion.

By acknowledging Hamas’s ability to control most of the humanitarian aid flowing into Gaza, Israel essentially admits its failure to achieve one of the main objectives of the war: eradicating the terrorist group’s influence.

Back in the fall of 2023, following the heinous Hamas attacks of October 7, the Israeli army entered the Gaza Strip in an effort to free hostages captured by the terrorists and to eliminate the group itself. Although the final surviving captives returned home following the announcement of the peace deal last month, Hamas remains a force to be reckoned with.

And once again, Hamas

Under the terms of the truce signed on Oct. 13 in Sharm El-Sheikh, even an undefeated Hamas was not supposed to pose a threat to Israel. The organization committed to disarming and handing over control of the Gaza Strip to a civilian administration. In reality, however, things have turned out differently. The group’s leadership, without formally abandoning its promises, is doing everything possible to prevent full disarmament from taking place. Representatives of Hamas’s military command and political bureau have agreed to disarm only after a truly independent Palestine with a bona fide army appears.

In short, despite threats from Trump to personally intervene, Hamas has no intention of laying down its weapons. This is already leading to breakdowns of the truce. On Oct. 28, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accused the militants of armed provocations and ordered the resumption of strikes on the Gaza Strip.

Locals report that on that day the Israeli Air Force dropped numerous bombs on a single location, possibly after Israeli forces identified a heavily fortified Hamas bunker capable of withstanding multiple hits. In any case, after the bombardment, both sides returned to the fragile truce and expressed their willingness to adhere to the ceasefire agreement.

Of course, Hamas is not the only militant group still operating in the Gaza Strip. In a significant development, Islamic Jihad in Palestine also announced its willingness to abide by the peace agreements with Israel. Whereas Hamas has often been willing to engage in good faith diplomacy to resolve issues like prisoner exchanges, Palestinian Islamic Jihad has generally been immovable — and even criticized Hamas for excessive flexibility. Still, the two groups tend to coordinate their large-scale military actions both tactically and strategically, and the past month has been no exception.

Nevertheless, Gaza still has forces that are not bound by any peace commitments. Chief among them are the leftist Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine and the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine. Before the truce, they coordinated their actions with Hamas but made no statements indicating their willingness to cease hostilities once Hamas paused the war. Quite possibly, these groups were behind the provocations that led Netanyahu to resume airstrikes on Gaza.

Beyond the yellow line

Gaza is also home to four pro-Israel armed groups which, likewise, are not bound by any peace commitments. All of them operate within the so-called “yellow line,” a temporary boundary agreed upon with Hamas that separates Palestinian-controlled areas of Gaza from those under Israeli control. These four groups are de facto Israeli proxies, and they operate in the territories the Israeli army withdrew from after the truce. The leaders of these groups openly acknowledge receiving support, including weapons, from Israel (even if Israeli officials remain silent on the topic).

The agreed-upon boundary between the “Hamas-controlled” and “Hamas-free” parts of Gaza — the so-called “yellow line” — is quickly becoming a physical reality. Israel has even begun installing yellow markers along this boundary.

The visible marking of what is supposed to be a temporary boundary is a troubling signal. Under the peace plan, the Israeli army is expected to withdraw completely from the Gaza Strip once authority in the region is handed over to a temporary technocratic government, and Hamas is supposed to cease to exist as a military and political force. The placement of physical markers along the boundary indicates that Israel does not believe these transformations will occur in the foreseeable future.

“It looks like a de facto creeping annexation of Gaza,” Jeremy Konyndyk, president of the Refugees International advocacy group and a former USAID official, told The Guardian. Konyndyk and other observers believe that dividing the Gaza Strip into two parts and placing one under full Israeli control could lead to the emergence of Israeli settlements and the gradual incorporation of these territories into the Jewish state, without regard for the opinions of their Arab residents.

The problem is that beyond the yellow line, the opinions of ordinary residents carry just as little weight with the forces controlling the territory. In the areas it controlls, Hamas has mobilized up to 7,000 fighters who are tasked with carrying out extrajudicial executions, arrests, and torture against Gaza residents suspected of spying for Israel or engaging in armed resistance against Hamas. Dozens have been shot without trial, hundreds detained, and many publicly beaten in the streets to the point that they suffer broken limbs. None of this resembles preparations for a peaceful transfer of power to apolitical technocrats, as is prescribed by the peace agreement. On the contrary, it appears to be an effort to weaken any opposition to Hamas as much as possible.

Israel is betting on this persecuted opposition, viewing them as temporary allies — which is why the covert arms deliveries to anti-Hamas clans continue. It is unlikely, however, that Israel seriously expects these fragmented — and often mutually hostile — militias to meaningfully weaken the terrorist organization.

Rather, its objective is to create a “nuisance fire” — a constant presence behind Hamas lines that diverts the group's attention away from its confrontation with Israel. Paradoxically, by supplying these clans with weapons to keep Hamas occupied inside Gaza, , Israel effectively prolongs the truce between itself and Hamas. In simple terms, it is using its temporary allies to prevent Hamas from rebuilding its strength and resources for renewed large-scale military operations against the Israeli army.

A coalition of the unwilling

Under the ceasefire agreement, once the active phase of hostilities in the Gaza Strip ends, certain international peacekeeping forces are supposed to enter. Their role would be to prepare the region for transfer to the aforementioned government of apolitical technocrats.

However, the agreement contains no specific requirements for either the international contingent or the future ministers. The plan submitted to the UN Security Council by the U.S., which also envisages the deployment of peacekeepers, does little to clarify the situation. Even taking into account Trump’s agreements with several Arab states, there has been no rush of volunteers willing to assume peacekeeping, let alone administrative, responsibilities in Gaza. The region is too unpredictable — on top of that, it currently lies in ruins.

It is likely that the relatively small enclave (365 square kilometers) will be divided into two separate sectors. In the one under Israeli control, residential neighborhoods and civilian infrastructure will be rebuilt, albeit at the cost of Palestinian sovereignty in the area. On the other hand, the sector remaining under Hamas’s control will be characterized by destruction, chaos, and terror — albeit under the slogans of an emergent Palestinian state. It is far from certain that the residents of Gaza, who have survived three years of war and are now enduring weeks of hunger and a truce constantly interrupted by airstrikes, will be given any choice as to which part of their native enclave they will live.