A few hours after Israel launched a massive bombing campaign across Gaza on Tuesday, the Hamas military wing had not mounted a perceptible counterattack.
It was by far the deadliest day since a ceasefire in Gaza started about two months ago. The Gaza Ministry of Health, which does not distinguish between civilians and combatants, said that more than 400 people had been killed in the aerial bombing that started before dawn.
But throughout the day, there was a notable absence of rocket fire by Palestinian activists or attempts to ambush Israeli soldiers.
Suhail al-Hindi, an official of Hamas, reacted to the assault saying that the group hopes to restore the ceasefire but reserves the right to respond.
“How to react is left to those on the ground,” he said during a telephone interview. “They know and understand how to respond to the occupation.”
There is no doubt that the War of Israel at 15 months against Hamas has weakened the group which has long reigned over Gaza. Israel killed thousands of his fighters and destroyed a large part of his tunnel network that has been used, among other things, to store weapons. And that has undermined Hamas’ ability to shoot rockets in Israel.
Mr. Al-Hindi recognized that the capacities of Palestinian militant groups in Gaza were degraded by war, but he said that they still had the capacity and the desire to fight.
“The problem is not that of equipment and weapons,” he said. “It is a will, and I believe that there is a lot of will to resist this occupation.”
Hamas has worked to come together in the past two months since a cease-fire agreement with Israel has entered into force. He collected unploded bombs in all Gaza and reuse them as an improvised explosive appraisal, according to a member of the Qassam brigades, the Hamas military wing. He also recruited new members and replaced the commanders who were killed, said the member, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive details.
Seven members of the Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee of the Israeli Parliament said in a letter that they had recently learned that Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic jihad, another militant group in Gaza, have more than 25,000 and 5,000 fighters in the territory respectively.
“Qassam brigades are still able to face the Israeli occupation,” said Ibrahim Madhoun, Palestinian analyst of Gaza who is close to Hamas.
The absence of any military response to the new Israeli attack could mean that the group was focused on preparing a fight in the event of an Israeli soil invasion, he said.
The Israeli army said it attacked Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic jihad, a smaller militant group in Gaza, targeting combatants, missile launching positions and weapons stocks. Lieutenant-Colonel Nadav Shoshani, spokesperson for the Israeli army, said that Israel had carried out “preventive” strikes on Hamas after having received indications that the group planned attacks on Israeli civilians and soldiers.
On the other hand, a declaration of the office of the Israeli Prime Minister on the Gaza attacks underlined Hamas’ refusal to accept the proposals of President Trump of the Middle East to extend the ceasefire, without referring to the planning of the attacks.
Hamas denied that he planned to attack the Israeli troops, saying that the Israeli affirmations were “baseless and false pretexts to justify his return to war”.
The Israeli bombing has followed weeks of unsuccessful negotiations to extend the ceasefire between Israel and Hamas.
Despite the intensity of Israel’s attacks, Madhoun said Hamas would not give in Israeli requests to end its role in Gaza or put a large number of the remaining hostages without guarantee of a permanent end to war.
“Hamas does not want climbing, but it will not surrender,” he said.
Israel has tried to put pressure on Hamas to release living hostages in exchange for an extension of the ceasefire, without giving the group the assurances that it seeks to finish war permanently.
Israel has sworn throughout the war that it will not allow Hamas to continue to govern Gaza and ensure that it will never be able to set another attack again like that of October 7, 2023, which sparked the war. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that the war ends, the government of Hamas and the military wing should be dismantled, a position shared by its right -wing coalition partners in government.
While Hamas suggested that he was willing to give up the civil governance of Gaza, it firmly rejected dissolving its military wing, a critical source of its power in the enclave.
During the initial phase of the ceasefire, the group tried to use hostage transfer to show that it was always a powerful forces in Gaza. Almost every time he transferred Israeli captives to the Red Cross, he organized theatrical ceremonies starring hundreds of activists wearing masks and firearms.
Michael Milstein, a former Israeli military intelligence officer specializing in Palestinian affairs, said that Hamas could first try to measure if Israel provided long -term assault or limited salvo before responding.
“They want to know where things are going,” said Milstein. “If all will end in two hours, they don’t want to waste what remains of their ammunition. But if it happens for a long time, they will answer.”
Iyad Abuheweila And Aaron Boxerman Contributed reports.
