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The Hamas chief Yahya Sinwar has for years overseen a secret police pressure in Gaza that performed surveillance on on a regular basis Palestinians and constructed recordsdata on younger folks, journalists and people who questioned the federal government, in line with intelligence officers and a trove of inner paperwork reviewed by The New York Times.
The unit, referred to as the General Security Service, relied on a community of Gaza informants, a few of whom reported their very own neighbors to the police. People landed in safety recordsdata for attending protests or publicly criticizing Hamas. In some circumstances, the data recommend that the authorities adopted folks to find out in the event that they had been carrying on romantic relationships exterior marriage.
Hamas has future an oppressive system of governance in Gaza, and plenty of Palestinians there know that safety officers watch them intently. But a 62-slide presentation on the actions of the General Security Service, delivered solely weeks earlier than the Oct. 7 assault on Israel, reveals the diploma to which the largely unknown unit penetrated the lives of Palestinians.
The paperwork present that Hamas leaders, regardless of claiming to characterize the folks of Gaza, wouldn’t tolerate even a whiff of dissent. Security officers trailed journalists and folks they suspected of immoral conduct. Agents acquired criticism faraway from social media and mentioned methods to defame political adversaries. Political protests had been considered as threats to be undermined.
Everyday Gazans had been caught — behind the wall of Israel’s crippling blockade and underneath the thumb and fixed watch of a safety pressure. That dilemma continues immediately, with the added risk of Israeli floor troops and airstrikes.
“We’re going through bombardment by the occupation and thuggery by the native authorities,” Ehab Fasfous, a journalist within the Gaza Strip who appeared within the recordsdata of the General Security Service, mentioned in a cellphone interview from Gaza.
Mr. Fasfous, 51, is labeled in a single report as amongst “the foremost haters of the Hamas motion.”
The paperwork had been offered to The Times by officers in Israel’s army intelligence directorate, who mentioned they’d been seized in raids in Gaza.
Reporters then interviewed individuals who had been named within the recordsdata. Those folks recounted key occasions, confirmed biographical info and, in Mr. Fasfous’s case, described interactions with the authorities that aligned with the key recordsdata. The paperwork reviewed by The Times embrace seven intelligence recordsdata starting from October 2016 to August 2023. The army intelligence directorate mentioned it was conscious of recordsdata containing info on at the very least 10,000 Palestinians in Gaza.
The General Security Service is formally a part of the Hamas political party however features like a part of the federal government. One Palestinian particular person conversant in the inside workings of Hamas, who spoke on the situation of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the matter, confirmed that the service was one in all three highly effective inner safety our bodies in Gaza. The others had been Military Intelligence, which usually focuses on Israel, and the Internal Security Service, an arm of the Interior Ministry.
Basem Naim, a spokesman for Hamas, mentioned the folks accountable for the General Security Service had been unreachable throughout the warfare.
With month-to-month bills of $120,000 earlier than the warfare with Israel, the unit comprised 856 folks, data present. Of these, greater than 160 had been paid to unfold Hamas propaganda and launch on-line assaults towards opponents at residence and overseas. The standing of the unit immediately is unknown as a result of Israel has dealt a big blow to Hamas’s army and governing skills.
The Israeli intelligence authorities consider that Mr. Sinwar immediately oversaw the General Security Service, in line with three Israeli intelligence officers, who spoke on the situation of anonymity as a result of they weren’t approved to debate the matter publicly. They mentioned the slide present was ready for Mr. Sinwar personally, although they didn’t say how they knew that.
The presentation mentioned that the General Security Service works to guard Hamas’s folks, property and knowledge, and to assist its management’s decision-making.
Some slides targeted on the private safety of Hamas leaders. Others mentioned methods to stamp out protests, together with the “We Want to Live” demonstrations final 12 months that criticized energy shortages and the price of residing. Security officers additionally tracked operatives from Palestinian Islamic Jihad, an ideologically aligned militant group that usually companions with Hamas.
Some ways, like amplifying Hamas’s personal message, seemed to be routine politicking. In different situations, officers instructed utilizing intelligence to undermine opponents and deform their reputations, although the recordsdata had been obscure about how that was to be executed.
“Undertaking quite a lot of offensive and defensive media campaigns to confuse and affect adversaries through the use of non-public and unique info,” the doc learn.
Security officers stopped Mr. Fasfous on his option to a protest final August, seized his cellphone and ordered him to go away, a report says. Mr. Fasfous confirmed that two plainclothes officers had approached him. The authorities searched his current calls, and wrote that he was speaking with “suspicious folks” in Israel.
“We advise that closing in on him is important as a result of he’s a destructive one who is filled with hatred, and solely brings forth the Strip’s shortcomings,” the doc mentioned.
The most irritating factor, Mr. Fasfous mentioned, was that the officers used his cellphone to ship flirtatious messages to a colleague. “They needed to pin an ethical violation on me,” he mentioned.
The report doesn’t embrace that element however does describe methods to “cope with” Mr. Fasfous. “Defame him,” the report mentioned.
“If you’re not with them, you turn into an atheist, an infidel and a sinner,” Mr. Fasfous mentioned. He acknowledged supporting protests and criticizing Hamas on-line, however mentioned the folks he was in contact with in Israel had been Palestinians who owned meals and clothes firms. He mentioned he helped run their social media accounts.
The General Security Service’s objectives are just like these of safety companies in international locations like Syria which have used secret items to quell dissent. The recordsdata of the General Security Service, although, point out ways like censorship, intimidation and surveillance somewhat than bodily violence.
“This General Security Service is rather like the Stasi of East Germany,” mentioned Michael Milshtein, a former Israeli army intelligence officer specializing in Palestinian affairs. “You all the time have a watch on the road.”
Palestinians in Gaza stay in worry and hesitate to specific dissent, analysts mentioned.
“There are lots of people training self-censorship,” mentioned Mkhaimar Abusada, a professor of political science from Gaza City. “They simply don’t need issues with the Hamas authorities.”
That view clashes with probably the most strident feedback of Israel’s leaders, like President Isaac Herzog, who blamed Gazans for not toppling Hamas earlier than the Oct. 7 assaults.
“There’s a complete nation that’s accountable,” he mentioned. “This rhetoric about civilians weren’t conscious, not concerned, it’s completely not true. They may have risen up.”
The General Security Service, the recordsdata present, additionally tried to implement a conservative social order.
In December 2017, for instance, the authorities investigated a tip {that a} girl was appearing immorally with a person who owned a clothes store. A safety report famous that she visited the store for an hour on in the future, then greater than two hours the subsequent. The report introduced no proof of wrongdoing, however proposed that “related events” deal with the matter.
An October 2016 report described younger women and men performing unspecified “immoral acts” at a Palestine Liberation Organization workplace in Khan Younis at evening. Hamas sees the Palestine Liberation Organization as a compromised entity, whose chief too usually favors Israeli pursuits. The report provided no proof of misdeeds however advisable summoning a person who claimed to be in possession of movies and footage.
The recordsdata additionally present that Hamas was suspicious of international organizations and journalists.
When Monique van Hoogstraten, a Dutch reporter, visited a protest encampment alongside the border with Israel in April 2018, the authorities famous probably the most banal of particulars. They famous the make and mannequin of her automobile and her license plate quantity. They mentioned she took footage of kids and tried to interview an aged girl Ms. van Hoogstraten confirmed the reporting journey in an interview with The Times.
The file advisable additional “reconnaissance” on journalists.
None of the recordsdata reviewed by The Times had been dated after the beginning of the warfare. But Mr. Fasfous mentioned the federal government remained considering him.
Early within the warfare, he mentioned he took photos of safety forces hitting individuals who fought over spots in line exterior a bakery. The authorities confiscated his digicam.
Mr. Fasfous complained to a authorities official in Khan Younis, who informed him to cease reporting and “destabilizing the inner entrance,” Mr. Fasfous recalled.
“I informed him I used to be reporting on the reality and that the reality gained’t harm him, however that fell on deaf ears,” he mentioned. “We can’t have a life right here so long as these criminals stay in management.”
