Despite lack of local protests, Gaza City evacuation threatens Hamas’s tight grip
Why are there no protests in Gaza against Hamas, who is threatening it on the ground, and what will happen without the human shield?
Israel’s security establishment has assessed that the public in Gaza rarely demonstrates against Hamas due to deep fear and tightening control, but noted that the organization is not immune to internal threats.
A senior security source explained that “the Palestinian public is not revolting and is not taking to the streets,” but emphasized that local clans are beginning to challenge Hamas rule. The source warned that when hundreds of thousands of residents relocate from the southern Gaza Strip, Hamas will remain exposed without the “human shield” that has so far protected it in the heart of Gaza.
An official and authorized security source said that “the Hamas leadership is not really interested in the Palestinian public” and that they have expressed this several times. From their perspective, “100,000, 200,000, 300,000 will die – it doesn’t interest them.”
According to the source, this is a direct quote from senior Hamas official Khalil al-Hayyah, adding that “the population doesn’t interest Hamas as long as it controls the Strip and as long as the population does not challenge it enough.”
Regarding why Gaza’s population does not challenge Hamas, the source said: “We saw the public demonstrations in a very limited way in February 2024. These demonstrations stopped for a very long period of time. They hardly happened, and then on May 25, the demonstrations started again in the north of the Gaza Strip, in Beit Lahiya, and they spread to other areas in the Gaza Strip, both in Gaza City and in Khan Yunis and in general.”
Palestinians from clans hold guns and melee weapons to secure aid trucks in Beit Lahiya, in the northern Gaza Strip, June 25, 2025. (credit: REUTERS/Mahmoud Issa)
These demonstrations comprised thousands of people, said the source, but at some point they “faded and even disappeared.”
“Here and there you see protests against the war, and here and there some protests about some event or another.”
The security source added, “The Palestinian public in Gaza, for the most part, is not revolting, not taking to the streets, and not expressing it openly. In behind-the-scenes conversations, they address it – they say they would be very happy for Hamas to leave, but they are not expressing any public protest. I think it is based mainly on fear and challenge and the fact that Hamas holds the territory.”
Hamas has two challenges
Nevertheless, the senior source said Hamas faces two challenges that will intensify as the fighting in Gaza continues. “There are clans that challenge Hamas. Some of them were in the headlines, such as Abu al-Shabab, and some were not in the headlines, but they exist and pose a challenge. They challenge Hamas mostly in their living area without having a broad impact on the Strip. Then this does not spread into a major governance challenge.
“Hamas’s big challenge will be when they see that hundreds of thousands of people will move from north to south, and I estimate that they will move. I estimate that this will challenge them in the context of their ability to deal with the IDF when they are not under human control.”
The security official dismissed criticism that Israel is bringing products into Gaza that do not meet the threshold for humanitarian aid while the hostages are starving in the tunnels.
“The policy of bringing in aid is clear. We bring in things that are within the basic humanitarian threshold, according to a very clear definition.”
