How Gaza’s aid crisis broke Hamas and starved the Strip

When Israel launched its controversial US-backed aid plan for Gaza, it aimed to stop Hamas’s alleged profiteering from the seizure and sale of humanitarian supplies.

The aid delivery plan overseen by the controversial Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) has proved a blood-soaked catastrophe.

Palestinians carry sacks of humanitarian aid in the northern Gaza last Sunday.Credit: AP

The Gazan health authorities report that hundreds of people have been killed by gunfire as they queue for food at the GHF aid points controlled by Israeli troops and American contractors.

It has also caused Hamas’s worst financial crisis in decades, Israeli officials report.

The terror group has been unable to pay its fighters or repair its network of tunnels and hideouts beneath the Strip. Cash shortages have reportedly left Hamas unable to pay salaries for police and ministry employees.

Money reserves amassed before, or during the early stages of, the war have run short, while Israeli strikes have devastated the leadership and fractured its grip on the besieged territory.

Former Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar, who was killed by Israel last October.Credit: AP

Hamas for years received large sums from Iran, Qatar and others, and was also able to tax cross-border commerce.

Israel has long alleged that Hamas also made money by seizing and selling international aid entering Gaza, though this has been denied by the United Nations and aid agencies.

That income ended, officials say, when Israel imposed a blockade in March, and then began using the GHF, set up jointly by the US and Israel, to run aid hubs and bypass UN-run distributions.

The UN, the European Commission and major international aid organisations have said they have no evidence that Hamas has systematically stolen their aid. The Israeli government has not provided proof.

Twenty-eight countries, including Britain, condemned the new aid arrangements this week amid widespread reports of starvation and hundreds of people being shot as they tried to get food.

The countries’ joint statement described as “horrifying” the recent deaths of over 800 Palestinians who were seeking aid, according to the figures released by Gaza’s Health Ministry, which is run by Hamas, and the UN human rights office.

“The Israeli government’s aid delivery model is dangerous, fuels instability and deprives Gazans of human dignity,” the countries said.

“The Israeli government’s denial of essential humanitarian assistance to the civilian population is unacceptable.”

Palestinian health officials have said at least 101 people have died of hunger during the conflict, most of them in recent weeks.

Palestinians ride on an aid truck heading into Gaza City on Tuesday.Credit: AP

Food that does arrive in the coastal Strip is often sold and resold at extortionate prices, said Rabiha Abdel Aziz, a 75-year-old mother of nine living in a displacement camp in western Gaza.

“I don’t know how people can eat,” she told the London Telegraph, explaining that the family can no longer even afford a kilo of flour, which currently costs $53.

She said: “My grandchildren wake up in the morning and ask me for a piece of bread that we don’t have … Where will we get the money to buy food at this price? We are dying of hunger and bombing.”

‘People collapse in the streets’

Salem Jehad, a father of four who is living in a camp west of Gaza City, said he was unable to find milk for his newborn son.

He said: “All my children have lost half their weight, and I am the same. Most people don’t have money.

“Two years without work during the war, with the crossings closed and aid entering scarcely, people are collapsing in the streets from weakness and hunger. We drink water with salt to satisfy our hunger.”

A Palestinian woman feeds her children at a tent sheltering a displaced family in central Gaza City.Credit: AP

Jehad said access to food had dramatically worsened since GHF took over the distribution, and he wanted a return to the previous UN-run model.

The UN said on Tuesday that Israeli forces had killed more than 1000 Palestinians trying to get food aid in Gaza since the GHF began operations in May.

‘Hamas’ strategy relied on the suffering of Gazans … when this failed, it foolishly doubled down because it had nothing else in its toolbox to deal with Israel’s ferocious reaction to October 7’.

Ahmed Fouad Alkhatib, Realign for Palestine

Aid distributions have been marred by chaotic scenes and frequent reports of Israeli forces firing on people waiting to collect rations.

Israel’s military has disputed previous death tolls, but has said its troops have at times fired warning shots, and it is investigating accusations of civilian deaths.

Jehad said: “Now we are running into death traps. Gazans are dying to bring a kilo of flour and rice.”

Hamas’ mistake over ‘strategy of suffering’

Ahmed Fouad Alkhatib, who leads the Realign for Palestine lobby group, said that Hamas had counted on the humanitarian crisis to bring the war to an end.

He told The Washington Post: “Hamas’ strategy relied on the suffering of Gazans.

“But when this strategy failed, it foolishly doubled down on this approach, in large part because it had nothing else in its toolbox to deal with Israel’s ferocious reaction to October 7 and the world’s inability to stop it.”

Smoke rises following an Israeli air strike in northern Gaza.Credit: AP

Lior Akerman, the head of national resilience at the Institute for Policy and Strategy (IPS) at Reichman University, and a former chief of staff in Shin Bet, Israel’s MI5, said Hamas had “almost completely disintegrated in the Gaza Strip”.

“All the senior commanders were killed and all the frameworks of the fighting disintegrated,” he said

“Today, in the absence of commanders, Hamas members in the Gaza Strip are operating like independent, armed militias.

Tents sheltering displaced Palestinians are seen amid war-damaged buildings in Gaza City.Credit: AP

“In every area, the terrorists continue to do the best they can with the weapons they possess, and they are effectively waging a guerrilla war against the Israel Defence Forces (IDF). This type of fighting could last for years and wear down the IDF in a never-ending war.”

Truce negotiations held up

Israel and Hamas are holding indirect talks in Doha aimed at reaching a 60-day truce and a hostage release deal.

But there has been no sign of a deal yet, and discussions have reportedly been held up by Hamas’ negotiators in Doha being unable to reach representatives in Gaza since late last week.

Ronen Solomon, an Israeli intelligence analyst, said as Hamas had been degraded in Gaza, the group’s centre of gravity had shifted abroad.

He said that with only Izz ad-Din al-Haddad, commander of the Gaza City Brigade, remaining as a senior figure in Gaza, “a dramatic change has occurred”.

“The centre of gravity shifted from the Strip to Hamas abroad,” he said. “And in particular to Khalil al-Khayya, who was very much involved in the planning of October 7 and continues to lead an extremist line from the Hamas base in Qatar.”

The Telegraph, London

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