Gaza war’s first major anti-Hamas protests may not oust it, but are weakening its hold

The past three days have seen rare protests against Hamas break out in multiple locations in the Gaza Strip, with hundreds, if not thousands, of Palestinians taking part.

Demonstrations have occurred in Beit Lahiya and the Jabalia refugee camp in the north, in the Sabra neighborhood of Gaza City, and in Khan Younis and Nuseirat in the south and center of the enclave. Specifically, anti-Hamas protests have yet to be documented in central Gaza’s Deir al-Balah, where hundreds of thousands of displaced people from both the north and south have taken refuge, but there, too, there have been rallies opposing the war and showing solidarity with Gazans protesting elsewhere. This is no isolated phenomenon.

The protests have featured direct calls for the ouster of Hamas, along with anti-Israel chants and demands to end the war and the suffering it has caused for Gaza’s civilians. At the beginning of March, Israel stopped allowing aid into Gaza to pressure Hamas into releasing more hostages under an extended first phase of the now-collapsed ceasefire deal. The move has driven up prices and reduced the food supply in Gaza. The resumption of the war almost two weeks ago has included renewed airstrikes and evacuation orders.

The civilian populace is suffering, but Hamas has been unyielding to date, insisting on sticking to the original deal, which was supposed to have proceeded to a second phase in which all remaining living hostages would be released, the IDF would complete its withdrawal, and a permanent ceasefire would take effect.

Dr. Harel Chorev, a senior researcher at the Moshe Dayan Center for Middle Eastern and African Studies at Tel Aviv University, believes that the roots of the protest precede the war triggered by Hamas’s October 7, 2023 invasion and massacre: “At least some of this resistance to Hamas’s rule has been brewing for more than a year and a half — that is, even before the war. But the war triggered it, because of the destruction it has caused. The last straw was this month’s resumption of the fighting. Gazans thought they were finally done with it, only to be bombed and displaced again. It’s tremendously demoralizing.”

Chorev saw preliminary signs of the unrest online: “Two weeks ago, when this round of fighting began, some Gazans posted strong criticism of Hamas on social media: ‘We’re sick of you; you’ve destroyed Gaza; you’re a bunch of murderers.’ These are the same messages that have now featured [on placards and in chants] at the protests. What started online has spilled into the streets.”

وتتواصل مظاهرات الأهالي في #غزة والمطالبة لحماس بترك الحكم والمشهد في #قطاع_غزة .. والأهالي يطالبونها بالرحيل .. #أوقفوا_الحرب #اوقفوا_الحرب pic.twitter.com/kZ4VFcJjlM

— تيسير تربان/أبوعبدالله (@tyesertrban) March 27, 2025

Since these are the first major protests in Gaza against Hamas since the war started, however, with much of Gaza in ruins and tens of thousands dead, it begs the question why substantive public opposition has surfaced only now.

Hamza Hawidi, a Gazan who participated in a previous, less resonant demonstration against Hamas and is now living in Germany, said anguish and despair among participants seem to have outweighed fear of brutal Hamas retribution.

“The reason people haven’t done this for a year and a half is that they were afraid,” he told The Times of Israel in a Zoom interview. “Ziad Abu Haya, a resident of Gaza, appeared in a television interview during the war and said one sentence: ‘Protect us from Hamas before you protect us from the Jews.’”

Having been beaten up for denouncing Hamas in August, Abu Haya was reportedly killed by Hamas in December. Hamas, Hawidi charged, “beat him to death for that one sentence.”

“If I see someone speak out and then get killed, I won’t criticize Hamas,” Hawidi continued. Now, however, he said, it seems the fear barrier has been broken.

For nearly two days, Hamas maintained public silence regarding the protests, neither addressing them nor violently suppressing them. This contrasted with 2019, when Hamas police quickly crushed an eruption of protest.

Senior Hamas official Bassem Naim commented on the protests for the first time on Wednesday night, stating that they were only to be expected from a people experiencing mass destruction and that it was natural for them to call for an end to Israeli aggression. He also subtly criticized the calls to overthrow Hamas rule, claiming “that external actors were exploiting the spontaneous protests to serve Israeli interests.”

Naim’s remarks, made in response to a question during an interview with a Qatari TV channel, indicated that Hamas can no longer ignore the phenomenon and that its response strategy, for now, is to try to frame the protests as anti-war and anti-Israel rather than anti-Hamas.

The demonstrations have indeed included voices condemning the war due to the prolonged suffering in Gaza, but also direct calls for the overthrow of Hamas, holding it to blame for the current situation in the Strip.

“Hamas is too smart to come out and crush the protesters with force,” Hawidi argued. “It knows the whole world is watching these protests now. It aims to dismantle the protests by framing them as demonstrations against the war rather than against Hamas.”

Another Gazan who now lives abroad described another element in the Hamas bid to counter and suppress the protests. Hamza al-Masri, a Gazan who migrated to Turkey and has been posting protest footage that he received privately from people in Gaza, released a video on Wednesday night claiming that Hamas was threatening him.

“This is the first video I’m filming, sort of a will,” he said. “I have received death threats from the Hamas leadership. I am very happy to help Gaza speak out; it is a victory. For 18 years [under Hamas rule], no one in Gaza could speak. If you don’t see me anymore, be happy. If they kill or kidnap me — it’s in God’s hands.”

الان :: و لليوم الثالث على التوالي شعب الجبارين في جباليا .
شاركو ووصلو صوت الناس , كل الاعلام خذلهم كونوا انتم اعلامهم#اوقفوا_الحرب pic.twitter.com/cctiMsvKB3

— الناشط حمزة المصري (@hamza198708) March 27, 2025

The Dayan Center’s Chorev sees another reason why Hamas is not violently targeting the demonstrations directly and publicly, for now. “The fact that these protests are happening during [a resumed period of] war makes it difficult for Hamas. Simply put, if Hamas operatives go out and suppress the [rallies] with weapons, they become an easy target for Israeli drones.”

Instead, for now, he said, “they prefer to threaten local leaders in Gaza, including prominent clan leaders.”

The chances of the protests succeeding remain unclear. There are two million residents in Gaza, with tens of thousands in the military wing of Hamas. Overthrowing the regime would require the internal collapse of the strongest armed force in Gaza.

Chorev does not rule this out, and believes Israel’s resumed military campaign and the diminished aid influx could help. “It is possible that eventually, those currently filling the ranks of Hamas’s military wing will abandon it because the food and water they received in exchange for enlistment will run out, due to the ongoing ban on humanitarian aid into Gaza,” he said.

Hamas has recruited individuals, some of them very young, “who are not as ideologically committed as those who came before them and were killed,” he said. “This could have an impact. The ongoing blockade could trap Hamas in a very difficult situation.”

Chorev also emphasized the “American green light” for Israel to maintain the aid blockade: “I met an IDF officer who used to brief the previous American administration weekly on humanitarian aid that entered Gaza. The Americans were highly focused on how much aid was being delivered and of what type. In the Trump administration, they are not interested; they don’t want briefings. This is a crucial difference, and it opens up possibilities for increasing pressure on Hamas, including significant pressure on the civilian population.”

Even if the current wave of protests ultimately ebbs or is suppressed, Chorev thinks it won’t be in vain: “Hamas is a social movement that embeds itself in the hearts of people, and once its image is damaged, it loses that hold. This has a long-term effect, a social effect that could shape Gaza’s governance after the war and influence the [Gaza] public’s willingness to accept a different government instead of Hamas.”

Hawidi believes that the protests alone won’t bring down Hamas, but considers them to be highly important, including symbolically: “We don’t want Hamas to fall while the people remain silent. People shouldn’t think that overthrowing Hamas is an Israeli demand; it is a demand of the people in Gaza. But will it alone topple Hamas’s rule? Based on my knowledge and familiarity with Hamas — no.”

Still, Hawidi expresses some optimism about what is playing out, including in the context of his own decision to leave Gaza in the summer of 2023: “I didn’t leave Gaza because I hate it. I left because there was no hope for change. Everyone treated Hamas’s rule in Gaza as the permanent reality, and that was it.

“When I left, if you said that Hamas was a terrorist organization, it meant that you would be executed. But now I see my people saying for themselves, ‘Hamas is a terrorist organization.’”