Palestinian groups fighting Hamas in Israel’s interest

“What are ‘criminal groups’ when it comes to Hamas-run Gaza?” the official said.

Palestinian tribal gangs in Gaza fighting against Hamas is in Israel’s interest, former top Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) official Shalom Ben Hanan told The Jerusalem Post on Thursday.

He was responding to the controversy about the agency providing weapons to such groups under orders from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Ben Hanan retired in 2022 after 27 years in the agency at the equivalent rank of a major-general in charge of a whole division in comparison to IDF ranks, and was on Netanyahu’s shortlist in the running for the agency’s chief this spring.

“According to reports, the phenomenon of arming Palestinian tribal gangs to harm Hamas is a positive development – this is saving the lives of our soldiers,” in various cases, he said.

In other words, if Gazan Palestinians can fight Hamas and push it out of certain areas, IDF soldiers will not need to do that fighting and will be at lower risk of Hamas guerrilla ambushes in those Gazan sectors.

He noted that foreign reports have reflected on past potential instances where Israel might have assisted tribal gangs in the Sinai to fight off ISIS terrorists as a potential model for what might be going on now in Gaza.

Tribal gangs versus Hamas

Moreover, he stated that the idea of “tribal gangs rising up against Hamas should be of positive interest to Israel,” in its goals and future plans for Gaza.

Responding to Yisrael Beytenu head Avigdor Liberman’s framing of Netanyahu as having sidestepped the cabinet to provide weapons to “Gaza criminals,” Ben Hanan responded, asking rhetorically, “What are ‘criminal’ groups’ in the context of Gaza?”

Essentially, Ben Hanan was arguing that many people who might be considered “criminal” by Hamas might not be criminal at all.

Alternatively, even if some of the Gazan groups receiving weapons from Israel are, in fact, criminals, they still might be preferable as interlocutors in Gaza if they conclude that their local non-ideological and calculated interests are to forge a stable relationship with Israel – as opposed to Hamas, which is religiously and ideologically committed to Israel’s destruction.

The Shin Bet and IDF intelligence did not deny their involvement in providing weapons to the Gaza tribal…