While paying lip service to post-war “day after” plans, Israel is actively orchestrating a new and dangerous reality in Gaza, one that exposes a profound hypocrisy at the heart of its strategy. A months-long Sky News investigation has uncovered that Israel is funnelling weapons, vehicles, and cash to a Palestinian rebel group with a history of looting and extremist ties. This covert campaign, aimed at dismantling Hamas, simultaneously seeks to strip the Palestinian people of any agency, ensuring their future is dictated not by the ballot box, but by an Israeli-backed warlord.
The beneficiary of this support is Yasser Abu Shabab and his militia, the Popular Forces. Once a looting gang, the group is now being groomed as a contender for power. This move starkly contradicts Israel’s stated justification for its war—to remove a terrorist regime—by actively cultivating an alternative armed faction with its own troubling extremist links, thereby perpetuating the very cycle of militant rule it claims to be breaking.
An Engineered Oasis and the “Coordination” Office
In the devastated landscape of southern Gaza, a 50-hectare enclave stands apart. Here, residents have ample food, medical facilities, and even brand-new SUVs, a scene flaunted on social media. This is the headquarters of the Popular Forces, strategically placed along “Looters’ Alley,” the route for aid trucks from the Kerem Shalom crossing.
According to Hassan Abu Shabab, a senior commander, the group’s initial wealth came from smuggling banned cigarettes. After deadly clashes with Hamas began, he says Israel initiated a formal supply line. Hassan detailed a “coordination office” run by the Palestinian Authority that liaises with Israeli and Arab security services to bring in their supplies.
“This office… was established for us,” Hassan stated. “It provides us with weapons and money and with everything our people and forces need.”
This account was confirmed by a serving IDF soldier, Sami*, from the Desert Reconnaissance Battalion stationed at Kerem Shalom. “Israel helps him, it gives him grenades, it gives him money, it gives him vehicles, it gives him food, it gives him all types of things,” Sami told Sky News, revealing the direct complicity of the Israeli state.
The Hypocrisy of “Humanitarian” Aid and Military Support
The investigation revealed that the US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) is providing food aid to the Popular Forces. Video evidence shows GHF pallets at their camp. While the GHF defended this as “true neutrality,” UNRWA’s Gaza director labelled it a “complete breach of humanitarian principles,” which require aid to be impartial and based on need alone.
This perversion of aid is a microcosm of a larger hypocrisy: Israel is channeling resources through an armed group while simultaneously being accused of restricting humanitarian access for the wider, starving population of Gaza. Furthermore, evidence suggests this militia receives direct military support. Satellite imagery shows an Israeli airstrike destroying a house from which Hamas had ambushed Popular Forces fighters just a day prior, indicating a level of tactical coordination that belies Israel’s claims of simply battling terrorist groups.
Denying Democracy: A Return to Warlord Politics
The most glaring contradiction lies in Israel’s stated desire for a peaceful post-war future and its active efforts to make that future impossible. Analysts see this as a classic “divide and conquer” strategy.
Professor Neve Gordon of Queen Mary University of London explained, “The idea […] is to try and turn Gaza into a land controlled by warlords in different parts, so there is no unity among the Palestinians.” This strategy, he notes, leads to internal struggles that “last years or decades.”
This approach is a direct assault on Palestinian democratic rights. By propping up an unelected militia leader with no popular mandate, Israel is explicitly working to prevent the emergence of a unified, legitimate Palestinian leadership. It mirrors the policy of the past, where Israel reportedly supported Hamas in its early days to undermine the secular Fatah party, playing factions against one another to prevent a cohesive political front.
The group’s composition deepens this hypocrisy. One of its senior commanders, Issam Nabahin, was previously identified by both Hamas and Egyptian intelligence as an Islamic State fighter. Israel’s alliance with such figures, while waging a war under the banner of defeating Islamist extremism, reveals a cynical realpolitik where the goal of control trumps any consistent principle.
“We’d Like to Run Everything”
In June, the Popular Forces publicly denied any political ambitions. However, speaking to Sky News, Commander Hassan Abu Shabab was strikingly candid about his group’s aspirations, speaking of reforming the school curriculum and holding a referendum on relations with Israel.
When asked about their ultimate goal, he was unequivocal: “We’d like to run everything.”
This statement lays bare the undemocratic future Israel is engineering for Gaza. It is a plan to replace one form of armed rule with another, more pliable one, thereby denying the Palestinian people the fundamental right to choose their own government. The hypocrisy is stark: a military campaign justified by liberating Gazans from tyranny is being followed by a covert operation to install a new, Israeli-sponsored autocrat. As diplomatic talks drag on, Israel is ensuring that whatever political solution is eventually agreed upon, the ground in Gaza will already be held by its chosen strongman.
The governments of Palestine, Egypt, Jordan, and the UAE, as well as the IDF, Shin Bet, Yasser Abu Shabab, and the Popular Forces, did not respond to requests for comment.
