Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said the country used armed gangs in Gaza to help fight Hamas, his admission coming after a new wave of military strikes on the besieged Gaza Strip that left at least 52 Palestinians dead.
Netanyahu said the government had “activated” powerful local clans in the enclave on the advice of “security officials”, his video statement posted to X on Thursday coming hours after former Defence Minister Avigdor Lieberman accused him of deploying the tactic.
The statement marked the government’s first public acknowledgement that it had backed the armed Palestinian groups based around powerful families, which stand accused by aid workers of carrying out criminal attacks and stealing aid from trucks as starvation stalks the entire territory due to a punishing Israeli blockade.
An Israeli official cited by news agency The Associated Press said that one of the groups Netanyahu was referring to was the so-called Popular Forces, led by Yasser Abu Shabab, a local clan leader in Rafah.
Last month, Israeli newspaper Haaretz reported on the group’s activities – though it was named the “Anti-Terror Service” in the report – saying that sources in Gaza claimed it consisted of roughly 100 armed men operating with the tacit approval of the Israeli military.
In recent weeks, the Abu Shabab group announced online that its fighters were helping protect supply shipments to new US- and Israel-backed distribution centres run by the shadowy Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF).
“The Israeli opposition claims that there was no consultation within the Israeli government or the Israeli cabinet,” said Al Jazeera’s Hamdah Salhut, reporting from Jordan’s capital Amman. “Netanyahu says that these armed gangs … could essentially help the Israelis defeat Hamas in Gaza.”
“But it’s not going down well within Israel, where people are saying that these are armed criminal enterprises within the Gaza Strip. That they should not be armed and that these are Israeli weapons that are being put in their hands,” she said.
‘Human abattoir’
Netanyahu made his statement on another deadly day in Gaza, the military hitting targets throughout the besieged coastal enclave where the crippling blockade has brought the population to the brink of mass starvation.
Deadly incidents, killing more than 100 and wounding many more, at aid distribution sites run by the GHF since last week have sparked widespread condemnation, with Israeli troops opening fire on Palestinians seeking aid on four separate occasions since last week.
Chris Gunness, former spokesperson for the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA), told Al Jazeera that the operations of the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation had turned Gaza into a “human abattoir”.
“Hundreds of civilians are herded like animals into fenced-off pens and are slaughtered like cattle in the process,” he said.
Amid growing international condemnation, GHF shuttered operations for a full day on Wednesday, saying the next day that it would reopen two aid distribution centres in the Rafah area of southern Gaza. It did not say when aid distribution would resume.
At least 52 Palestinians were killed on Thursday, according to hospital sources who spoke to Al Jazeera. The sources said 31 bodies had arrived at Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, with 21 admitted to Gaza City’s al-Ahli Arab and al-Shifa hospitals.
Israel killed four journalists in an attack on al-Ahli Hospital itself, also known as the Baptist Hospital, in Gaza City
Gaza City local Fadi al-Hindi told Al Jazeera that he had seen one of the strikes on al-Nasser Street, near the al-Shifa Hospital, witnessing scenes of death after running outside his tent to check on his children.
“When I arrived, I saw a man in pieces; he had been riding a bicycle, and the lower half of his body was gone. Everyone in the street was injured, and we started to collect the pieces of the wounded,” he said.
At least three Palestinians were killed in the strike, reportedly including children.
The Palestinian news agency Wafa also reported five deaths in areas around Khan Younis, four west of Beit Lahiya in the north, and one south of Gaza City, as well as the injuring of a child near Bureij in central Gaza.
Wafa also reported that Israeli forces opened fire on Palestinians trying to reach an aid centre near Wadi Gaza.
In the meantime, Hamas chief Khalil al-Hayya has said in a prerecorded speech that the group did not reject a proposal for a ceasefire in Gaza put forward by US special envoy Steve Witkoff, stating that it had instead requested some changes to ensure an end to the war.
Al-Hayya added that Hamas is ready to engage in further talks and that communications with the mediators are ongoing. Israel broke off a previous truce in March to resume the war in Gaza.
