Hamas is reconstituting its terror army in the Gaza Strip, recruiting up to thousands of new Palestinian youngsters into its torn ranks, according to a report published on Monday by The Wall Street Journal.
After a relatively long period of almost no rockets being launched from the Hamas-ruled territory, the terror group managed to fire some 20 rockets into Israel in the past 14 days.
Moreover, 10 Israeli soldiers fell in battle in the area of Beit Hanoun in northern Gaza over the past week.
“We are in a situation where the pace at which Hamas is rebuilding itself is higher than the pace that the [Israel Defense Forces are] eradicating them,” Amir Avivi, a retired Israeli brigadier general, was quoted as saying by the WSJ.
“Mohammed Sinwar is managing everything,” he added, referring to the younger brother of former Hamas leader and mastermind of the deadly Oct. 7, 2023, attack Yahya Sinwar, who was killed by the IDF in October.
According to the report, after the elimination of Sinwar, Hamas’s remaining leadership attempted to form a collective leadership council, but the organization’s members in Gaza opted to operate autonomously under Mohammed Sinwar.
A senior Israeli official from the IDF’s Southern Command told the WSJ that “We are working hard to find him.”
Sinwar, who previously commanded the now largely dismantled Khan Yunis Brigade, is considered to be the “brain” behind the kidnapping of IDF soldier Gilad Shalit in 2006, and worked to release his older brother from Israeli prison as part of the Shalit exchange deal in 2011.
Because Sinwar, believed to be aged about 50, was not incarcerated for a long time in Israel like his brother was, he is “less understood by Israel’s security establishment,” the report suggested.
Political analysts have named him and Izz al-Din Haddad, Hamas’s military head in northern Gaza, as the current top chiefs of the terrorist organization in the Gaza Strip, which, at the end of the day, has the final say over the ongoing ceasefire negotiations and the hostage-prisoner exchange deal.
“Hamas is in a very strong position to dictate its terms [in the negotiations],” Mohammed Sinwar told mediators in a written message that was shared with the WSJ.
In another message he said, “If it is not a comprehensive deal that ends the sufferings of all Gazans and justifies their blood and sacrifices, Hamas will continue its fight.”
The report further emphasized that while Hamas’s new recruits are largely young and militarily inexperienced, they are capable of carrying out “hit and run” attacks in small cells using guns and anti-tank missiles, which require less military training.
Hamas is able to persuade them to join by promising them and their families food, aid and medical care, largely seized humanitarian aid that enters the Gaza Strip, the report added.
Most of the recruitment efforts take place at funerals and prayer gatherings, the WSJ reported.
With the Gaza Strip borders cut off with Israeli military presence, Hamas is rearming itself mainly with unexploded ordnance that it can then refashion into improvised explosives.
