JERUSALEM, Israel – Violent crackdowns, arbitrary arrests, trumped-up police charges, imprisonment and even live ammunition to deter innocent women, children and people with disabilities from demanding basic rights like electricity are just some of the harrowing testimonies from Gaza. Strip captured in a series of video clips recently released by the US-based Center for Peace Communications.
The series, “Whispered in Gaza,” which uses animation and voice alteration technology to protect the identity of speakers, offers a rare and unfiltered look at life in the poverty-stricken and besieged Palestinian enclave. But the anger and fears expressed by those who bravely share their stories are not directed at their neighbor, Israel. Rather, their criticism and despair is directed at their autocratic rulers: Hamas.
“Your own thoughts are taken away from you when you walk down the street, the walls are covered with pictures, slogans and stories of Hamas leaders and you feel like you are in a war zone. Is it a city or a military barracks? ?” asks a man, whom the video calls “Iyad.”
“Gaza is a city. However, they have penetrated it to the walls, the billboards, even the smell,” he continues. “The city has taken on a vibe of backwardness, inhumanity, militarism. At any moment it could be fired on, fired on: missile strikes, response, repeat. We are conditioned to this.”
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Palestinian members of the Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades, the armed wing of the Hamas movement, take part in a meeting on January 31, 2016 in Gaza City. (Mahmud Hams/AFP via Getty Images)
In another of the clips, “Ahmed” recounts how the electricity company, accompanied by the Hamas-controlled police, arrived to cut off power in his neighborhood. Those who tried to stop them, including Ahmed’s cousin, a boy with Down syndrome, were beaten and shot with live ammunition. When Ahmed decided to document the injuries and uploaded a video online, he was forced to go into hiding for three days before Hamas authorities caught him and imprisoned him.
“I’m not trying to make you think I’m a hero,” he says in his testimony. “I’m just one of thousands of people who have dealt with similar and worse situations.”
“When nasty videos come out, like the one of hundreds of Gazans celebrating the carnage in Jerusalem last week, they give the impression that Gazans are completely behind Hamas and that’s exactly what Hamas wants,” said Joseph Braude. , founder and president of the Center for Peace Communications, told Fox News Digital in an interview.
“Hamas claims that the people are involved in the resistance, that is their claim to legitimacy, but the reality is that the hundreds who attend such events are not a representative sample of the millions who stay home,” he said.
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Hamas, a designated terrorist organization, has maintained a tight grip on Gaza since it violently seized the territory in 2007 after Israel unilaterally withdrew in 2005. The militant Islamist group, which receives funding and training from Iran, imposes a strict Islamic code to its more than two million residents and continues to engage in the fight against Israel, including the endless firing of rockets and incendiary devices into Israeli territory, as well as mass protests along the border fence.
Yahya Sinwar, leader of the Hamas terror group in the Gaza Strip at a celebration of the 35th anniversary of the founding of Hamas. December 14, 2022. (TPS/Majdi Fathi)
Israel, along with Egypt on its southern border, continues to maintain a strict civil and military blockade on the area, controlling the flow of goods and humans in and out of the Strip, and responding to attacks by Hamas and other Palestinian militants. groups
Braude noted, however, that recent polls show a diversity of views among Gazans, with most saying they are unhappy with the rocket fire from their territory and blaming Hamas for starting the war with Israel. There is also deep resentment towards Hamas leaders for leaving the Strip or hiding in bunkers while civilians suffer casualties from these ongoing outbreaks.
“The people of Gaza don’t trust them. [Hamas] but they are suppressed,” Braude said, adding that many even refer to Hamas, not Israel, as the occupying force in Gaza.
Michael Milshtein, director of the Forum for Palestinian Studies at the Dayan Center at Tel Aviv University, Israel, told Fox News Digital that the videos were an accurate reflection of attitudes in the Gaza Strip and that according to his estimates, only about 25% of the population: mostly Hamas members and their families, supported the Hamas government.
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“I talk to people in Gaza a lot and it is quite clear that the majority of the public is suffering and strongly opposes the Hamas administration,” he said. “The big problem, however, is that there is a deep fear of Hamas and a clear understanding that any protest against the organization will be met with great force.”
Milshtein said there have been some civil protests in recent years, mainly due to the dire economic situation, but that “for the moment, Hamas is still strong and while there is a possibility of another outbreak of protests against them, I’m not sure.” will be effective.”
A Palestinian boy sits on a swing hanging from a tree trunk in the southern Gaza Strip city of Rafah on February 3, 2023. (Reuters/Ibraheem Abu Mustafa)
Braude, whose organization is backed by the Arab Council for Regional Integration, which promotes Arab-Israeli engagement, said the aim of the project was not only “to help Gazans break the blockade” imposed by Hamas, but also start a new conversation about the situation worldwide.
Since its launch two weeks ago, the Whispers in Gaza series, which was presented by a variety of independent media outlets and is available in six languages (Arabic, English, French, Spanish, Portuguese and Persian) has garnered some three million views. , with the largest audiences being in the Arab world and North America.
In Gaza, Hamas reportedly reacted angrily to the videos by sending armies of bots to take down the organization’s distribution platforms and manipulating some of the clips with its own voiceovers. In one of the altered versions, Braude said, the testimony of a Palestinian mother describing her anxiety about sending her children to a Hamas-run school was changed to the voice of a mother expressing pride that her son was joining the endurance.
By monitoring a broader reaction to the videos on social media, Braude said, “we have seen the beginnings of what we would like to achieve, which, simply put, is to start a new conversation about what is happening in Gaza, a conversation which is broader and more complete than the polemics that arise every time there is a war”.
“We interviewed dozens of people inside Gaza on the condition that we wouldn’t show their faces and we would alter their voices and we brought in a very creative team of animators, musicians, artists, to turn their voices into, I think, quite beautiful videos that, from In some ways, they’re most memorable in the way they artistically represent the lives of these people,” he explained.
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An applicant is measured at a Hamas recruitment center in Gaza City on June 3, 2013. (Reuters/Mohammed Salem)
In perhaps the most powerful of the 25 testimonials, a woman named only “Zainab” tells viewers: “There is a false stereotype that Palestinians in Gaza love rockets and war. Gazans don’t love war, the wars that go on in Gaza are waged by the Hamas government for political purposes that only serve them.”
“We do not want war, we want a dignified life, our mental and physical health is at risk due to a situation that we did not choose,” he continues. “A faction is fighting on behalf of the Palestinian people but not all Palestinians agree. My fight is to communicate with the Palestinians and Israelis and make them understand that I am a human being here in Gaza, not a beast or a terrorist. or a gun lover because in the end guns won’t get us anywhere.”
Avi Melamed, a former Israeli intelligence official and founder of Inside the Middle East, an educational show, told Fox that “these videos have the potential to have an impact, but only if they manage to change the narrative.” [about Gaza] in the West and start a new process in which Western circles finally hold Hamas accountable.”
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“If these videos can spark a new discussion where Hamas, which acts as a government for its people, is no longer exempt from any responsibility, that will empower a lot of people in Gaza, I would even say the majority of people there, who they resent Hamas,” he said.
The voices and identities of Gazans featured in the videos have been independently authenticated by experts.
