Secret Hamas Files Show How It Spied on Everyday Palestinians
Secret Hamas Files Show How It Spied on Everyday Palestinians
Hamas monitored political activity, online posts, and apparently even love lives. Palestinians were stuck between an Israeli blockade and a repressive security force.
The Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar has for years overseen a secret police force in Gaza that conducted surveillance on everyday Palestinians and built files on young people, journalists and those who questioned the government, according to intelligence officials and a trove of internal documents reviewed by The New York Times.
The unit, known as the General Security Service, relied on a network of Gaza informants, some of whom reported their own neighbors to the police. People landed in security files for attending protests or publicly criticizing Hamas. In some cases, the records suggest that the authorities followed people to determine if they were carrying on romantic relationships outside marriage.
Hamas has long run an oppressive system of governance in Gaza, and many Palestinians there know that security officials watch them closely. But a 62-slide presentation on the activities of the General Security Service, delivered only weeks before the Oct. 7 attack on Israel, reveals the degree to which the largely unknown unit penetrated the lives of Palestinians.
. . .
Everyday Gazans were stuck — behind the wall of Israel’s crippling blockade and under the thumb and constant watch of a security force. That dilemma continues today, with the added threat of Israeli ground troops and airstrikes.
Yeah no shit Hamas is an authoritarian corrupt movement. That still doesn’t justify the genocide on Palestinians and the apartheid, occupation and systematic rape, abuse, torture, and also the Israeli mass surveillance that is used to blackmail people or even track them down to murder them.
If anything Hamas is the product of the systematic marginalization and humiliation of the Palestinians
If anything, it makes the current conflict even worse: Not only have gazans been forced to suffer from israeli occupation, they have also been systematically oppressed by Hamas and now they're being slaughtered for their sake. I wouldn't be surprised if this pushed more people towards Hamas or other terrorist organizations in the long run.
Yeah. There's, sadly, room in the world for more than one murderous government. I also have no doubt that, if Hamas had the opportunity, they would kill all Israelis. But that is still no excuse for the ongoing slaughter the IDF is committing. An atrocity remains an atrocity.
Hamas wouldn’t bite the hand that feeds. Hamas is controlled opposition, directed by Israel, in Palestine to prevent a real opposition group wanting a two state solution from forming
Looks like there's a multi-pronged attempt to shift the narrative to "see? Hamas is bad, so Israel is justified" today based on articles being posted.
People say the same thing literally any time there's a negative story about Hamas. That isn't how this story is framed. Israeli policy (blockade) and military are not portrayed as a relative good at all. It also speaks directly against a narrative by some Israelis that Palestinians bear collective responsibility for the actions of Hamas.
The idea that we must help Hamas cover up their crimes is a bad one, however well-intentioned. If they don't want their crimes and misdeeds reported by the world, they should consider not committing any.
Some people can't think critically nor handle any nuance. It needs to be black and white for them, which is why they can't fathom a world where people recognize that Hamas is trash without also thinking Israel is justified.
The irony being that their thought process is identical to the people who claim any criticism of Israel is anti semitism.
The position that this article somehow benefits Gaza is undermined by the fact that all the sources are from the IDF. There is little difference between this article and your local newspaper uncritically reprinting the police departments press releases.
"Their unelected leadership was spying on Palestinians, hence we're justified in mass murdering Palestinians to get them"
I mean, it's the kind of excuse that worked for America's invasion of Iraq to the point that even nowadays there are still plenty of useful idiots justifying the resulting estimated 1.4 million Iraqui dead with "Saddam was a murderous dictator" (and yet in all those years caused 1/100 of the deaths America did in far less time)
As long as people keep falling for any old bollocks then any old bollocks is exactly what they will be given
We can talk all day about how bad Israel is, but these guys aren’t good guys either
There were some idiots like that, but anyone who wasn’t just being completely reactionary knew they were idiots.
The only good people in this are all the innocent, the problem is they are the ones doing the most dying on both sides
Everyday Palestinians? What genius propagandist came up with that one? Israel doesn't seem to make the distinction.
My thoughts exactly. Nearly everyone agrees that Hamas is bad; what we object to is the grossly excessive violence being applied to all Palestinians.
The NYT has been shown to be biased against Palestinians, so this, unfortunately, doesn't surprise me anymore. I used to trust the NYT as one of the more trustworthy sources, but am reluctant to give them any traffic anymore. It feels like, at least in the US, the right-wing crazies have won because "mainstream media" (all media, frankly) really is starting to feel untrustworthy.
I strongly dislike nearly everything about this timeline.
I think it’s less “right wing” per se and more that the news networks are corporate conglomerates with a narrative they want to propagate.
They also want to access to the politicians, who are in turn beholden to their donors. The politicians won’t give them access unless the media are willing to also subjugate themselves to the donor class narratives.
I think it’s more about the money on politics and the ruling that corporations are people and money is free speech that is the problem.
I think the media is corporations, which advocative for neoliberal policies in general, and because they want access to the politicians they have to be on board drinking the donor kool aid.
Just an anecdote but I find this doesn't align at all with what I've personally read from the NYT. I've been following their Gaza coverage pretty closely, and I really feel like it's been highlighting the injustice of what's going on quite well. Some of those articles describing the things happening to Palestinians literally brought tears to my eyes.
Their comment sections are pretty consistently full of genocide apologists flaming them for supposedly spreading Hamas propaganda too.
To be honest, I can somewhat understand that a major news outlet would want to avoid words like "genocide" even though I personally think there's no doubt that it's the right word to use. The debate around using these words is too toxic, and using them would quickly tip discourse even further into bullshit semantic arguments, in turn distracting from what's being reported.
Oh, look, a Look-over-there New York Times article about how it's the merelly authoritarian on the "other" side that are worse than the full blown Genocidal Fascists murdering an entire population - men, women and children, lots and lots of children - whilst claiming they're only going after said autoritarians.
I did NAZI that coming.
Read the article, it’s very informative for once.
The documents were provided to The News York Times by officials in Israel’s military intelligence directorate, who said they had been seized in raids in Gaza.
- None of it confirmed by secondary independent sources.
- Both writters of the article are Israeli and based in Israel.
- And the timing is convenint for Israel.
- Finally, lets not forget the New York Times' very special track record of pro-Israel Propaganda.
So the sources for all that are Israeli IDF spooks, none of it is independently confirmed, the writters are Israelis in Israel, this newspaper has been caught not long ago printing pure Propaganda for Israel and the timing of all this "information" "coming out" is right smack when Israel is preparing to go into overdrive in their Genocide which is justified as being to "eliminate Hamas".
Curiously if all of what Israel says is to be believed (including what they provided for this "article"), they're killing Palestinian civilians in huge numbers to supposedly get rid of their oppressors, a level of doublespeak we hadn't seen since Bush caused 1.4million Iraqi deads whilst claiming America was "freeing Iraqis from the murderous dictator Saddam Hussein").
It's funny that whilst originally I was inclined to believe the idea that Hamas are pretty straightforward authoritarians with a secret police and everything, after reading the article with a proper analyst's eye (analysis of information being something I have professional experienced in) I have actually put that predisposition to believe it aside since that piece is written by people who are not even in a position to be unbiased, for a newspaper which is heavilly biased, anchored on paperwork provided by a single-source who are the spooks of the very army commiting Genocide and murdering children in cold blood in Gaza, and which of course has not been independently checked, and comes at a time when this type of story is exactly what the nation all of the above are biased in favour of would want to spread to reinforce their long running Propaganda messaging, so one can only conclude this hit piece almost certainly the most pure unadulterated Propaganda imaginable.
The NYT is garbage state propaganda with no more journalistic credibility than the Enquirer
The NYT definitely has problems, but saying it has the same credibility as the Enquirer just makes you look ill informed. 🤡
Please. Of course the NYT are far from infallible, but "no more journalistic credibility than the Enquirer" is just a ridiculous statement. There's a lot to criticize about their reporting on Gaza, but at the same time they've published some of the rawest and most eye-opening coverage of the situation in Gaza I've come across.
While I certainly agree to an extent, They’re not quite as bad as the National Enquirer, that’s ridiculous. I read the Archive version and it is very detailed and informative. Describes how Hamas, who we know is paid by Israel, spied and monitored Palestinians., to control opposition and prevent a two state solution. It’s no wonder everything turned out the way it did, Israel wanted it to. Bring on your downvotes bots
Edit:autocorrect
Running a hamas hit piece during Israel's genocide. You know it's going to be legacy media.
what did you expect from a group created and funded by israeli intelligence to dismantle peaceful pro peace palestinian leftist organizations?
Paywall and the archive doesn't work...
But it sounds like this was pretty tame compared to other countries.
Shit, Israel goes into Gaza and abducts people for torture and long imprisonment without charges based on social media and claimed statements to informants...
And this says Hamas followed people to see if they were having an affair?
And kept files on people? Some journalists?
Hasn't Israel killed more journalists than even Russia the last couple years?
I don't see what's surprising or concerning here. And I don't see where the article is getting their info either. Are they just repeating IDF propaganda again?
Nevermind, I googled it.
The author is from multiple propaganda outlets in Israel, and belongs to pro-Israel "think tank"...
https://www.washingtoninstitute.org/experts/adam-rasgon
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Washington_Institute_for_Near_East_Policy
Although WINEP plays down its links to Israel and claims that it provides a 'balanced and realistic' perspective on Middle East issues, this is not the case. In fact, WINEP is funded and run by individuals who are deeply committed to advancing Israel's agenda ... Many of its personnel are genuine scholars or experienced former officials, but they are hardly neutral observers on most Middle East issues and there is little diversity of views within WINEP's ranks."[43]
Not only funded by AIPAC, but started be people with a bunch of AIPAC connections.
The Israeli Shin Bet does pretty much the same domestic espionage and there’s rightwing patrols in ultra orthodox neighborhoods as well monitoring for illicit relationships etc.
Thanks for the research, the fediverse is so much better than reddit.
I wouldn't say that.
Not only did Reddit have Poppingkream, but they could actually ban people and do something about vote manipulation.
There's more than a few accounts on here that if you get into an argument with them, you'll always see 3-5 down votes immediately, and they'll get an equal amount of up votes as soon as they post.
Because on some apps it takes two clicks to sign into a new account, and some people care enough about votes to switch over and over again.
On Reddit they'd crack down on that. Eventually giving an IP ban.
Here trolls have a bunch of options for random instances to make a new account and go right back at it.
Lemmy has its own problems, even if they're not the same as reddits.
I'd be more surprised by a country that's didn't spy on it's population.
The archive link is good, but archive.is is having performance problems today.
And it's not the first time NYT has run a direct propaganda piece. They have to do this once in a while for the Israeli government to reassert its hegemony over the narrative.
Yes, I know mediabiasfactcheck.com says NYT is excellent but that's just a reflection on mediabiasfactcheck.com.
Oh look, the NYT manufacturing consent for the military industrial complex. What a surprise.
Two things can be true at once. Israel can be violating human rights with their war in Gaza, and Hamas can be an oppressive piece of shit.
This is a false equivalency. The NYT has historically been complicit in manufacturing consent for US foreign policy interests with coverage framing and agenda-setting. By choosing what stories to cover and how to cover them, they can promote certain perspectives while downplaying others. Another user in this thread already pointed out that the author of this article is a pro-Israel propagandist.
yeah nobody remind em of the WMD fiasco
Has NYT only just figured out now that the nuance was never in Hamas being "the good guys" or not?
Hamas may be better than Israel right now in that they're not actively pulling a genocide, but nobody apart from Hamas thinks Hamas are really the good guys in this - but Hamas being a horrid government doesn't then somehow justify Israel's genocide against the "Everyday Palestinians" Hamas are oppressing.Governments spy on their own citizens? This is more shocking than learning Ivy League unis give preference to legacy students
No shit. By the way I'm not defending netanyahu. He's a pos.
The Palestinians will be better off with hamas gone thankfully. High price for voting in a terror group though.
A price paid mostly by those who didn't even have a chance to vote.
Oh my god that's awful.
Nearly as bad as an agency that does that to their own people and that of another nation.
Not seeing a lot of similar articles about Shin Bet though. Wonder why.....
I feel like some internal US whataboutisms would actually be appropriate here.
Overt Israeli actions show how it genocides everyday Palestinians.
I mean they are an oppressive police state just like israel ofc they spy on their own residents and prolly share the info with IDF in case they wanna get rid of someone they don't agree with or they'd be overthrown long ago if it wasn't for their authoritarianism and the tacit support/indifference from the israeli forces .Not all the journalist and dissidents that are being targeted/killed are done solely by israeli intel they are being fed that info from various sources including hamas. It would be a shocker if they aren't working together and sharing intel whenever it suits them to do so. Just like usa and their frenemies in Iraq or Afghanistan Ukraine or wherever they are operating. the western media will take this and turn it into a one sided hamas bad article without even mentioning israels complicit enabling policies.
Open secret
This is the best summary I could come up with:
The Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar has for years overseen a secret police force in Gaza that conducted surveillance on everyday Palestinians and built files on young people, journalists and those who questioned the government, according to intelligence officials and a trove of internal documents reviewed by The New York Times.
But a 62-slide presentation on the activities of the General Security Service, delivered only weeks before the Oct. 7 attack on Israel, reveals the degree to which the largely unknown unit penetrated the lives of Palestinians.
Those people recounted key events, confirmed biographical information and, in Mr. Fasfous’s case, described interactions with the authorities that aligned with the secret files.
One Palestinian individual familiar with the inner workings of Hamas, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter, confirmed that the service was one of three powerful internal security bodies in Gaza.
“This General Security Service is just like the Stasi of East Germany,” said Michael Milshtein, a former Israeli military intelligence officer specializing in Palestinian affairs.
An October 2016 report described young men and women performing unspecified “immoral acts” at a Palestine Liberation Organization office in Khan Younis at night.
The original article contains 1,459 words, the summary contains 197 words. Saved 86%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!