The latest skirmish between Israel and the Gaza Strip earlier this month proved once again that Hamas sends its “subcontractors,” as the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) likes to call them, into the field. Israel has suspected for years that the armed wing of Hamas uses the Al-Quds Brigades of Islamic Jihad and the Popular Resistance Committees whenever it wants to escalate tensions with Israel without engaging in an all-out clash. Such indirect action would provide the organization deniability for the attacks on Israel.
On May 5, for example, Islamic Jihad’s Al-Quds Brigades and armed members of the Popular Resistance Committees joined together in shelling IDF forces engaged in exposing an additional tunnel in Gaza along the border with Israel. The timing of the shelling, as the tunnel was being unearthed and just as Israel had stopped supplying cement to Gaza, was a signal to Israel that it was about to cross a red line that would force Hamas to react. This time, an escalation was averted only through Egyptian mediation efforts.
Israel formally blamed Hamas for the shelling because it had given the orders to fire, but it is also closely monitoring the growing military cooperation within the Gaza Strip.
Hamas, for its part, got what it wanted: drawing attention to Israel’s economic pressure on Gaza. The way it chose to do so illustrates the close cooperation among the various organizations operating in Gaza.
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