The New Hamas Insurgency
JVL Introduction
Earlier in August Hamas was offered a peace deal and rapidly said yes to it with virtually no haggling.
Some observers have taken this as a sign of weakness and exhaustion.
Leila Seurat, who has researched Hamas extensively, believes it might be “may be as much a strategic ploy as a symptom of duress”.
Despite its losses, Hamas has shown itself capable of recruiting and replenishing its militant base and clearly remains deeply rooted in Palestinian society.
Those roots are social but also technical. Israel has been incapable of destroying Hamas’s tunnel system, resorting instead to its scorched earth policy above ground.
But there are fissures in Israeli society as how to pursue the war and with what aims. There is a weariness with the war as casualties mount, reservists fail to turn up for duty and hostages fail to be rescued.
The costs of a full-scale war on the ground and in the tunnels could be enormously costly and Israel’s military haa no stomach for it, however much Netanyahu wants to commit to it.
RK
This article was originally published by Foreign Policy on Tue 26 Aug 2025. Read the original here.
The New Hamas Insurgency
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There are unconfirmed reports on various Palestinian platforms on X and on the internet, that the Al-Qassam Brigades have captured four Israei soldiers in the strip in the last three days. This ties in with a reported well co-ordinated ambush where an armed D9 bulldozer was attacked using a yashin weapon, but the driver escaped and a Palestinian fighter was martyred. The Israeli Army continues its strict censorship on its losses in the strip. But ,the thousands of injured and killed soldiers isnt lost on a zionist public, who have also witnessed a large increase in draft-resisters [see Refuser Solidarity Network], and suicides by ex-service personnel. The genocide is being conducted by using remote controlled vehicles, loaded with explosives. Israel makes up the numbers of Resistance fighters, because it dies know and it lies about its casualties. Assassination of Sinwa and other resistance fighters has strengthen their resolve. Israel is imploding and its soldiers becoming weary, in a genocide they cannot win. Jon Elmer from the Electronic Intifada on X, has a regular update with details of the resistance movment in the Gaza Strip:@jonelmer
This is a war of extermination. We must support the resistance in Gaza. If you were in Gaza, who would you support?
Hamas will only grow. I remember a film abut Bloody Sunday in Belfast, where British paras shot unarmed peaceful demonstrators. The final brief scene was of young men queuing to join the provisional IRA. Totally predictable.