Diminished Hamas switches to full insurgent mode in Gaza
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[June 06, 2024]
By Samia Nakhoul, Humeyra Pamuk and Jonathan Landay
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Hamas has seen about half its forces wiped out in
eight months of war and is relying on hit-and-run insurgent tactics to
frustrate Israel's attempts to take control of Gaza, U.S. and Israeli
officials told Reuters.
The enclave's ruling group has been reduced to between 9,000 and 12,000
fighters, according to three senior U.S. officials familiar with
battlefield developments, down from American estimates of 20,000-25,000
before the conflict. By contrast, Israel says it has lost almost 300
troops in the Gaza campaign.
Hamas fighters are now largely avoiding sustained skirmishes with
Israeli forces closing in on the southernmost city of Rafah, instead
relying on ambushes and improvised bombs to hit targets often behind
enemy lines, one of the officials said.
Several Gaza residents, including Wissam Ibrahim, said they too had
observed a shift in tactics.
"In earlier months, Hamas fighters would intercept, engage and fire at
Israeli troops as soon as they pushed into their territory," Ibrahim
told Reuters by phone. "But now, there is a notable shift in their mode
of operations, they wait for them to deploy and then they start their
ambushes and attacks."
The U.S. officials, who requested anonymity to discuss sensitive
matters, said such tactics could sustain a Hamas insurgency for months
to come, aided by weapons smuggled into Gaza via tunnels and others
repurposed from unexploded ordnance or captured from Israeli forces.
This kind of protracted timeframe is echoed by Israeli Prime Minister
Benjamin Netanyahu's national security adviser who said last week the
war could last until the end of 2024 at least.
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A Hamas spokesperson didn't respond to requests for comment on its
battlefield strategy.
In a parallel propaganda drive, some of the group's fighters are
videotaping their ambushes of Israeli troops, before editing and posting
them on Telegram and other social media apps.
Peter Lerner, a spokesperson for the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), told
Reuters they were still some way from destroying Hamas, which he also
said had lost roughly half of its fighting force.
Lerner said the military was adapting to the group's shift in tactics
and acknowledged Israel couldn't eliminate every Hamas fighter or
destroy every Hamas tunnel.
"There is never a goal to kill each and every last terrorist on the
ground. That's not a realistic goal," he added. "Destroying Hamas as a
governing authority is an achievable and attainable military objective,"
he added.
HAMAS LEADERS SINWAR AND DEIF
Netanyahu and his government are under pressure from Washington to agree
to a ceasefire plan to end the war, which began on Oct. 7 when Hamas
fighters stormed into southern Israel, killing more than 1,200 people
and seizing over 250 hostages, according to Israeli tallies.
Israel's subsequent ground-and-air campaign in Gaza has left the
territory in ruins and killed more than 36,000 people, according to
Palestinian health authorities. The United Nations says over a million
people face "catastrophic" levels of hunger.
There are about between 7,000-8,000 Hamas fighters reportedly entrenched
in Rafah, the last significant bastion of the group's resistance,
according to Israeli and U.S. officials. Top leaders Yahya Sinwar, his
brother Mohammed, and Sinwar's second-in-command Mohammed Deif are still
alive and believed to be hiding in tunnels with Israeli hostages, they
said.
The Palestinian group has shown the ability to withdraw rapidly after
attacks, take cover, regroup, and pop up again in areas that Israel had
believed to be cleared of militants, a U.S. administration official
said.
Lerner, the IDF spokesperson, agreed Israel faced a protracted battle to
overcome Hamas, which has ruled the Gaza Strip since 2006.
"There is no quick fix after 17 years of them building their
capabilities," he added.
Hamas has constructed a 500 km (310 miles) subterranean city of tunnels
over the years. The labyrinth, dubbed the Gaza metro by the Israeli
military, is roughly half the length of the New York subway system.
Equipped with water, power and ventilation, it shelters Hamas leaders,
command and control centers, and weapons and ammunition stores.
The Israeli military said last week that it had taken control of the
entire Gaza-Egypt land border to prevent weapons smuggling. About 20
tunnels used by Hamas to carry arms into Gaza were found within the
zone, it added.
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![](../images/060624PIX/news_m24.jpg)
A Palestinian fighter from the armed wing of Hamas takes part in a
military parade to mark the anniversary of the 2014 war with Israel,
near the border in the central Gaza Strip, July 19, 2023. REUTERS/Ibraheem
Abu Mustafa/File Photo
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Egypt's State Information Service didn't immediately respond to a
request for comment on Israel's claims of arms-smuggling from the
country. Egyptian officials have previously denied any such
clandestine trade is taking place, saying they destroyed the tunnel
networks leading to Gaza years ago.
ECHOES OF FALLUJA INSURGENCY?
The Gaza incursion is Israel's longest and fiercest conflict since
it invaded Lebanon to oust the Palestinian Liberation Organization
in 1982.
Netanyahu has defied domestic and international calls to outline a
post-war plan for the territory. U.S. Secretary of State Antony
Blinken has warned that the absence of such a roadmap could trigger
lawlessness in the enclave.
One Arab official told Reuters that criminal gangs had already
emerged in Gaza amid the power vacuum, seizing food deliveries and
conducting armed robberies.
The official and two other Arab government sources, who all
requested anonymity to speak freely, said the IDF could face similar
threats to those encountered by America in the city of Falluja in
2004-2006 following the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq.
A broad insurgency in Falluja swelled the ranks first of al Qaeda
and then Islamic State, miring Iraq in conflict and chaos from which
it has yet to fully emerge two decades later.
Washington and its Arab allies have said they are working on a
post-conflict plan for Gaza which involves a time-bound,
irreversible path to Palestinian statehood.
When the plan, part of a "grand bargain" envisioned by the United
States that aims to secure a normalizing of relations between Saudi
Arabia and Israel, is complete, Washington aims to put it to Israel,
the U.S. officials said.
A United Arab Emirates official with direct knowledge of the
discussions said a Palestinian invitation was needed for countries
to assist Gaza in an emergency operation, as well as an end to
hostilities, full Israeli disengagement, and clarity on Gaza's legal
status, including control of borders.
The emergency process could last a year and be potentially renewable
for another year, according to the UAE official who said the aim to
be to stabilize the enclave rather than rebuild it.
For reconstruction to begin, a more detailed roadmap towards a
two-state solution was needed, he added, as well as serious and
credible reform of the Palestinian Authority.
How the United States aims to overcome Netanyahu's repeated
rejection of a two-state solution, which Riyadh says is a condition
to normalizing ties, is unclear.
David Schenker, a former U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Near
Eastern Affairs, dismissed any suggestion of a clean IDF pullout
from the Palestinian territory.
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"Israel says it's going to maintain security control which means
that it's going to constantly fly drones over Gaza and they're not
going to be limited if they see Hamas re-emerging, they're going to
go back," said Schenker, a senior fellow at the Washington Institute
U.S.-based think-tank.
Gadi Eisenkot, a former Israeli military chief serving in
Netanyahu's war cabinet, has proposed an Egyptian-led international
coalition as an alternative to Hamas rule in Gaza.
In a closed-door briefing last week to the Knesset Foreign Affairs
and Defense Committee, he emphasized the complex nature of
anti-militancy warfare.
"This is a religious, nationalistic, social, and military struggle
with no knock-out blow but rather protracted warfare that will last
many years," he said.
(Reporting by Samia Nakhoul, Humeyra Pamuk and Jonathan Landay;
Additional reporting by Simon Lewis and Matt Spetalnick in
Washington, Dan Williams, James Mackenzie and Mark Bendeich in
Jerusalem, and Aidan Lewis in London; Writing by Samia Nakhoul;
Editing by Pravin Char)
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