In early November, as Sheikh Mohammed Abu Mustafa left a mosque in southern Gaza after afternoon prayers, a gunman on a motorcycle pulled up and shot him dead.
The Islamist group said it was a targeted assassination carried out by local militias backed by Israel.
Hamas-affiliated groups later claimed that the slain imam was a jihadist who harbored Israeli hostages during the Gaza war, and accused the killer of belonging to a new Israeli-backed militia led by Hussam al-Astar, a former prisoner of Hamas-ruled Gaza who is now openly working to topple the extremist group that has been in total control of the area for nearly two decades.
In a phone interview with CNN, al-Astar denied that his men assassinated Sheikh Abu Mustafa, but said he welcomed the Hamas member’s death.
His unidentified organization, the self-styled Anti-Terrorist Strike Force, took control of a village in the Israeli-occupied village of Khan Yunis in southern Gaza. From there, it carries out raids against Hamas while trying to expand its small following domestically.
As the dust begins to settle after two years of brutal war, Gaza is split in two. Hamas has reasserted its hold on the western half of the enclave from which Israel has withdrawn, and remains the dominant force in the area where the majority of Gaza’s population lives. But relatively few civilians remain east of Israel’s military demarcation line, the so-called Yellow Line. In Israeli-controlled areas, small armed groups are asserting their dominance and seeking to expand their influence.
At least five factions currently operate within the yellow line, under close Israeli surveillance. What began as a dispersed, opportunistic gang exploiting the chaos of the conflict has coalesced into a coordinated network of armed militias that are openly positioning themselves for a post-war role in Gaza if Hamas is removed from power.
“There is alignment between our groups. We have the same goal, the same ideology…We have the same objective,” al-Astar told CNN, referring to the defeat of Hamas.
The militias are armed with light weapons, dozens of fighters and several vehicles, and operate from separate bases throughout Israeli-held territory in Gaza. On social media, Gaza’s leaders regularly post propaganda videos showing masked men in makeshift black uniforms clutching rifles, singing awkward chants and vowing to “liberate” Gaza from Hamas.
Although these militias are small and lack the technology and support to fully replace Hamas, they are already destabilizing Gaza further. It is trying to use hit-and-run attacks to counter Hamas, which has consolidated its power in areas no longer under Israeli control since the ceasefire. The militia launched an insurgency within a rebellion, targeting Hamas at a key moment in the process of establishing governance in post-war Gaza.
Hamas is not sitting idle.
While Hamas is concerned about its position in the enclave and is now on a mission to corner them, ordinary Palestinians are growing anxious that the war-torn enclave could descend into open civil war. Reports of violence have been widely shared on social media, and one particularly gruesome video shared by Hamas-affiliated channels in October shows eight blindfolded people being killed in a Gaza City square, along with a group of masked fighters, some wearing green Hamas headbands.
Hamas-affiliated groups say those executed were collaborating with Israel or involved in security or criminal activities, but no evidence has been presented.
The most destructive of the anti-Hamas groups and the most openly backed by Israel is the so-called People’s Army, once led by Israeli-allied gang leader Yasser Abu Shabaab, who was suddenly killed this month after a family dispute in Gaza turned violent, his group said.
Hamas and its supporters widely celebrated his death and distributed sweets in celebration in the enclave, a sign of the Islamist group’s relief that one of its main internal challengers had been eliminated.
“This gang was one of the most serious causes of suffering for the people of the Gaza Strip… They were the main reason that led the occupation forces to the young people trapped in the Rafah tunnels, leading to their arrest and targeting,” the Hamas-affiliated group wrote on Telegram, referring to a group of Hamas fighters trapped in Israeli-occupied Gaza after the ceasefire.
But the militia’s ambitions clearly go far beyond toppling Hamas. Groups such as the Abu Shabab People’s Army in the south, the Ashraf Mansi People’s Army in the north, Hassam al-Astar’s anti-terrorism force in the east, and the Rami Haras People’s Defense Forces in central Gaza are actively seeking to prove their local governance capabilities.
The gang is recruiting civilians, inviting doctors, lawyers, teachers and others to join. Abu Shabab has openly offered monthly salaries for its fighters on social media, promising $1,000 for regular rank-and-file soldiers and $1,500 for officers willing to join him. Israel has acknowledged supporting the group, but it remains unclear how it is funded.
General Haras of the People’s Defense Forces told CNN that his group is primarily made up of men previously imprisoned by the Hamas-run government. Halas said the militia was formed in May with the initial mission of securing humanitarian aid routes in eastern Gaza in coordination with the West Bank-based Palestinian Authority.
He said the mission has since evolved into what he calls “a much larger project.”
“This is a very large project, and I’m a part of it,” he told CNN in a phone interview.
Jared Kushner, US President Donald Trump’s son-in-law and one of the chief architects of the Gaza Next Day Plan, said in October that rebuilding the enclave could begin in areas free of Hamas, pointing specifically to Rafah, where Abu Shabaab forces operate.
Militia leaders interviewed by CNN claimed they were participating in Gaza “the next day,” but it remains unclear when Israel will fully withdraw or whether it will have enough public support to govern a complete withdrawal.
“Our role will be very important,” Al Astar said, before revealing plans to renovate hospitals in the region where he works. “We are not a disappearing phenomenon. … (We) will always be there the day after tomorrow (plans).”
Two Israeli officials familiar with the matter told CNN that Israel will continue to support the militia even after Abu Shabab’s death. One source said his militia was supposed to be involved in securing the site for Rafah’s reconstruction.
Mohammed Shehada, a Gaza expert at the European Council on Foreign Relations, said militia members, their families and a small number of other vetted Palestinians would be allowed to live in Israeli-controlled territory as “disguised residents” of the rebuilt Rafah.
“Eastern Gaza is where the reconstruction is going. Western Gaza remains in ruins. Both are divided by a yellow line…The twist is that no one actually lives in eastern Gaza and no one is allowed to live there…so the gangs are now serving a false population,” he said.
It is unclear whether Gaza residents will consider moving to the Israeli-occupied territory. Israeli forces have already killed scores of Palestinians who approached the yellow line.
“It’s strange how people can move. If you get close to the yellow line, you die,” Magdy, a resident of Gaza City, told CNN, asking only to be identified by his first name to protect his identity. “Those who go will be considered spies (for Israel). There must be a Palestinian authority telling us to move. … We will only move if Israel withdraws.”
Amid the diplomatic impasse between the first and second phases of the ceasefire, militias have sought to position themselves as the future of Gaza. But without a governing plan, they have made their path even more uncertain, carving out their own interests as they continue to seek peace in a war-torn territory.
Abu Riyadh, another Gaza resident, said the majority of residents in western Gaza would not move into Israeli-controlled territory.
“Why are we moving into these (gang-controlled) areas? We’re going into unknown places.”
