It is almost a month since the ceasefire between Israel and Hamas went into effect in the Gaza Strip, and Hamas is taking advantage of the lull in the fighting to entrench itself by rearming, regrouping, recruiting new fighters, and tightening its grip on areas under its control.
For Hamas, US President Donald J. Trump's peace plan, announced in early October, is evidently nothing but a temporary ceasefire, or hudna, that should be exploited to ensure that the terror group, with the help of Qatar and Turkey, expands its political and military control over the Gaza Strip. This is precisely what Hamas has done for the past two decades. After each round of fighting with Israel ended in a ceasefire, the terror group would exploit the period of calm to restock and rebuild its military capabilities, eventually enabling it to launch its October 7, 2023, attack on Israel's southern communities.
Hamas still has not returned the bodies of all the Israeli hostages, despite repeated promises to honor the understandings of the ceasefire. This refusal, of course, is in violation of Trump's plan, which stipulates:
"Within 72 hours of Israel publicly accepting this agreement, all hostages, alive and deceased, will be returned."
Worse, the terror group has been caught staging a fake discovery of the remains of Israeli hostage Ofir Tzarfati in Gaza City before handing them over to the Red Cross. Drone footage released by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) shows Hamas terrorists removing a white body bag from a building in the Shajjaiyeh neighborhood of Gaza City at 4:07 p.m. on October 27, 2025, placing it in a pre-dug pit, and covering it with sand. Six minutes later, Red Cross personnel arrived at the scene. The terrorists then used a bulldozer to uncover the same bag, pretending to "find" it for the first time in front of the Red Cross representatives.
On November 1, DNA tests conducted by Israel's National Institute of Forensic Medicine found that the three partial remains Hamas returned to Israel a day earlier did not belong to any of the murdered Israeli hostages. As of November 3, Hamas was still holding eight bodies of Israeli hostages, in direct violation of the Trump deal.
Hamas undoubtedly knows where all the bodies are located, but the terror group is in no rush to hand them over to Israel. Hamas is pretending that it is facing difficulties locating the bodies under rubble. The terror group, however, has not been facing any difficulty in hunting down Palestinians suspected of "collaboration" with Israel or those who dared to criticize Hamas during the war. Hamas, in addition, is not in a hurry because it has a serious problem with phase two of the Trump plan, which requires the terror group to lay down and decommission its weapons.
What we are witnessing is a calculated delay that aims to buy time and exhaust the US administration until Trump abandons the numerous ultimatums he has issued to the terror group. The foot-dragging aims to allow Hamas to reassert control over the Gaza Strip.
According to some reports, Hamas has recruited up to 7,000 new fighters to reassert control over areas from which Israeli forces withdrew under the terms of the ceasefire deal. One Hamas official told the BBC that his group intends to prevent the Gaza Strip from falling under the control of local militias or what Hamas calls "collaborators" with Israel. As part of its efforts, Hamas has launched a massive crackdown on its critics, political rivals, and suspected gang members and "collaborators." Since the beginning of the crackdown, Hamas has killed dozens of Palestinians, often with public extrajudicial executions.
Hamas's actions and media interviews given by its officials since the beginning of the ceasefire show that the terror group has no intention of disarming or relinquishing security control over the Gaza Strip. Mohammed Nazzal, a senior Hamas official, told Reuters on October 17 that his group intends to maintain security control in the Gaza Strip during an interim period. Asked if Hamas would give up its arms in accordance with the Trump plan, Nazzal said:
"I can't answer with a yes or no. Frankly, it depends on the nature of the project. The disarmament project you're talking about, what does it mean? To whom will the weapons be handed over?"
Nazzal's remarks also constitute an infringement of the Trump plan, which states:
"All military, terror, and offensive infrastructure, including tunnels and weapon production facilities, will be destroyed and not rebuilt. There will be a process of demilitarization of Gaza under the supervision of independent monitors, which will include placing weapons permanently beyond use through an agreed process of decommissioning..."
Since the ceasefire went into effect, three IDF soldiers have been killed in two separate attacks by Hamas. Even the prime minister of Qatar, Hamas's main sponsor, stated that Hamas violated the US-brokered ceasefire when it attacked IDF soldiers. "What happened yesterday (October 28) was a violation," Prime Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman al-Thani said, referring to an incident during which Master Sgt. (res.) Yona Efraim Feldbaum was killed when Hamas terrorists fired several RPGs at IDF soldiers in the southern Gaza Strip.
Further evidence of Hamas's total disregard for the Trump plan and ongoing effort to reassert control over the Gaza Strip was provided on November 1 by the US Central Command (CENTCOM):
"On Oct. 31, the U.S.-led Civil-Military Coordination Center (CMCC) observed suspected Hamas operatives looting an aid truck traveling as part of a humanitarian convoy delivering needed assistance from international partners to Gazans in northern Khan Younis.
"The coordination center was alerted through video surveillance from a U.S. MQ-9 aerial drone flying overhead to monitor implementation of the ceasefire between Hamas and Israel.
"Operatives attacked the driver and stole the aid and truck after moving the driver to the road's median. The driver's current status is unknown.
"Over the past week, international partners have delivered more than 600 trucks of commercial goods and aid into Gaza daily. This incident undermines these efforts."
Since the beginning of the war on October 7, 2023, there have been many other reports of Hamas stealing humanitarian aid and selling it on the black market to residents of the Gaza Strip. Needless to say, the money goes to rebuilding Hamas's military capabilities and paying salaries to its members.
Instead of accepting responsibility and promising to stop the looting, Hamas responded to the CENTCOM statement by accusing the Americans of lying:
"We affirm that this accusation is entirely false and fabricated from its inception, and forms part of a deliberate media disinformation campaign aimed at smearing the Palestinian [Hamas] police forces, which are performing their national and humanitarian duty to secure aid and protect relief convoys."
Ahmed Alkhatib, a former Gaza native and respected political analyst, remarked:
"Stuffing Gaza full of aid and goods, only for Hamas's terrorists to steal, sell, or tax such items as a means of making money and staying a relevant fighting force, is never going to work as a long-term strategy. The issue isn't about a shortage of aid; it's about who will access this aid. There is no lasting stability or peace until Hamas is removed from Gaza, a step that will require the use of force against this fascist militia."
Even if we reach phase two of the Trump plan, Hamas will undoubtedly try to hoodwink everyone, including the Trump administration. Hamas, for instance, might hand over some of its assault rifles to a third party, but keep most of its tunnels and arsenal of weapons, including rockets and explosive devices. It is also possible that Hamas might try to incorporate its members into a new security force that would be deployed in the Gaza Strip, under the pretext that they are not affiliated with the terror group.
Moreover, there are indications that Hamas is already trying to indirectly control the proposed technocratic government in the Gaza Strip by nominating its own candidates. Any Hamas nominee should not be treated as an "independent" figure, because this person will place the interests of the terror group above others. Besides, it is inconceivable that Hamas should be allowed to have a say in the future of the Gaza Strip after the death and destruction it brought on both Israelis and Palestinians over the past two years.
It is time for the Trump administration and the international community to realize that what we are currently witnessing is an attempt to rebrand and reproduce Hamas to ensure its continued control of the Gaza Strip. Hamas should not only be removed from power, but from the entire political, economic, social and military arena.
Khaled Abu Toameh is an award-winning journalist based in Jerusalem.
