A Gazan Christian believes that the footage showing protesters in Gaza demonstrating against Hamas is a sign that those within the region have become fed up with the terror group’s rule and the ongoing war with Israel.
Khalil Sayegh spoke about the Israel-Hamas war on a podcast that aired last week with Joel Rosenberg, editor-in-chief of ALL ARAB NEWS and ALL ISRAEL NEWS. Sayegh, who has lost family members in the war, told Rosenberg that he has noticed a shift in attitude among Gazan civilians.
“Tens of thousands marched in Beit Lahia with slogans saying, ‘We are the resistance.’ That’s unprecedented,” he said. “In Palestinian culture, resistance is sacred. But now people are saying — if it comes at the price of our children, we’re against it.”
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He added that the demonstrators are not only protesting against Hamas, which has ruled the Gaza Strip since 2007, but they are also calling for an end to the war with Israel, which began after Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attack in southern Israel that killed over 1,200 people.
Media outlets in Gaza have shared footage of the protests against the terror group, The Times of Israel reported on Monday. Protesters at the first demonstration to take place in Khan Younis within several weeks took to the streets and reportedly chanted, “Stop the war and the displacement! Hamas out!”
Ihab Hassan, a Palestinian activist and director of the Human Rights Project, also shared a video in a Monday X post of the demonstrators allegedly chanting, “Hamas out, out!” Israeli Foreign Ministry Digital Diplomacy Bureau diplomat Yaki Lopez shared Hassan’s post, writing in response: “Peace begins when Hamas ends.”
The protests in Khan Yunis followed a wide evacuation order from the Israel Defense Forces, the first significant evacuation order since the IDF expanded its offensive in the Gaza Strip.
The goal of the IDF’s expanded military operations, codenamed “Gideon’s Chariots,” is to dismantle Hamas and secure the release of the remaining hostages, the Jewish News Syndicate reported on May 17.
During a briefing with journalists last week, Lt. Col. Nadav Shoshani, an IDF spokesperson to international media, outlined the operation’s goals, which include dismantling Hamas’ military and governing capabilities.
Shoshani was quoted as saying the IDF had been “increasing our operational control on the Gaza Strip, and we have been in this process calling the civilian population to distance themselves from the area of combat, giving them a chance to get out of harm’s way for their own safety.”
Gazan civilians took to the streets in March to protest Hamas, with a video shared on social media by the Center for Peace Communications showing the demonstrators declaring, “‘Hamas get out!’ Gaza’s people don’t want wars. They demand the end of Hamas’s rule. They demand peace.”
Another video of the protests shows a large group of protesters south of the Gaza Strip saying, “Oh the shame, you sold Gaza with dollars,” and, “Hamas is a terrorist.” In the footage of a protest in the Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza, the protesters chant, “Out, out Hamas!”
Phillip Dolitsky, an Orthodox Jew who works on issues related to foreign policy for the Philos Project, which advocates for pluralism in the Middle East, said in a March interview with The Christian Post that Gazan civilians “want Hamas out.”
One of the reasons for the protests, Dolitsky believes, is that the Israeli military has made Hamas vulnerable by eliminating multiple leaders who were key to the organization maintaining control over Gaza’s population.
Dolitsky speculated that many in Gaza have finally had enough of Hamas, highlighting reports of its militants stealing humanitarian aid and murdering innocent Gazans who attempted to take any of it.
“It is a brutal, dictatorial regime that not only hates Israelis but also hates even its own people who stand in the way of their genocidal aims,” he said, referring to the terror group as the “greatest barrier to peace.”
Samantha Kamman is a reporter for The Christian Post. She can be reached at: samantha.kamman@christianpost.com. Follow her on Twitter: @Samantha_Kamman
