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Hamas has set up checkpoints, engaged in gun battles with rivals and meted out violent beatings to Palestinians it suspects of having collaborated with Israel just hours after agreeing to a ceasefire to end a two-year conflict in the Gaza Strip.
According to Gazans interviewed by the Financial Times as well as images shared on social media and security updates from the UN and other agencies, the militant group has moved rapidly across the strip to reassert its control and settle scores.
The resilience of the group, after being hammered by the Israeli military, has caught Gazans by surprise, and will dominate negotiations ahead for US President Donald Trump’s 20-point peace plan.
While much of Israel’s security establishment is convinced that its offensive has dismantled Hamas’s military capabilities — including the ability to manufacture vast numbers of crude rockets — the rapid deployment of its fighters across the enclave revealed that the group remained capable of holding on to power within Gaza itself.
The ceasefire agreed to on Friday will allow for a swap of Israeli hostages for Palestinian prisoners by Monday, but the second phase of the plan requires Hamas to disarm. Security within the enclave is supposed to be maintained by an international stabilisation force.
But within hours of the ceasefire going into effect, Hamas made a public show of force in the enclave it has ruled with an iron fist since 2007.
In northern Gaza, it engaged in gun battles with two Palestinian clans that had received aid and weapons from the Israeli military, according to a western diplomat briefed on the clash.
In Gaza City, armed men in masks searched cars for weapons, while in Khan Younis, a former Hamas stronghold, there were talks with a local militia to hand over its weapons to Hamas to prevent more bloodshed, according to a message shared on a Hamas-affiliated Telegram channel.
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In other parts of the enclave, there was sporadic firing between the small militias that had sprung up during the chaos of the war, some of which had been armed by Israel.
Hamas has demanded that all rivals lay down their weapons within 48 hours and surrender their leaders to the militant group. Popular Forces, the largest rival that is run by Yasser Abu Shabab, controls larges swaths of Rafah and has received weapons, armoured cars and training from Israel, has refused to comply.
“We are staying in our territory around Rafah and will continue to defend our lands,” the militia said on its social media channels. “We have no intention of leaving the Gaza Strip.”
Israel’s offensive had targeted not just Hamas militants, but also the Palestinian police officers who had helped maintain law and order in the enclave.
Hamas said it would take over the job of “enhancing security and stability and protecting citizens’ rights.”
