Hamas is reportedly running out of money to pay its own fighter’s wages as Israeli forces slowly close in on the terrorist organization, intelligence officials told the Wall Street Journal Thursday.
Arab, Israeli and U.S. intelligence officials told the WSJ that targeted strikes against key Hamas officials and stopping the resale of aid packages to raise money have left the terrorist organization with little options in paying its soldiers. Many senior Hamas officials only received half of their pay through March, with some payments completely ceasing for Gaza government employees in recent weeks.
“The January ceasefire and concurrent rise in aid into Gaza allowed Hamas to replenish part of its cash supply,” Shoshana Bryen, senior director of the Jewish Policy Center, told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “Now, with aid constricted and a concerted effort by Israel to cut off access to bank funds and destroy the money distribution network, how much remains in the banks is irrelevant.”
The war has raged for over two years since Hamas launched its Oct. 7 attack on Israel, killing nearly 1,200 people while also taking 240 hostages. Much of the hostages have either been returned during a brief ceasefire from January to March, or died in captivity.
Hamas distributes its funds through a courier system, which creates easy targets for Israeli forces, officials told the WSJ. Locations for distribution are often set in stone, allowing Israel to direct their strikes more effectively.
Israel has said its sweeping security zones in Gaza will remain even after the formal closing of the war. So far, Israel has seized nearly half of all land in the strip after the initial ceasefire fell through in March and ground forces resumed operations.
“Even if they sit on large amounts of cash, their ability to distribute it would be very limited right now,” Eyal Ofer, an open-source researcher on Gaza’s economy, told the WSJ.
Hamas has utilized humanitarian flows from around the world to finance its operations, including charging taxes on merchants, collecting tolls on trucks at checkpoints and commandeering goods to sell, intelligence officials told the WSJ.
Sometimes, aid workers even directly participated in Hamas’ activities.
For example, workers from the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees (UNRWA) likely participated in the Oct. 7 attacks against Israel which ignited the war in 2023. The UNRWA had around 13,000 employees stationed in Gaza.
The Israeli Foreign Ministry did not respond to the DCNF’s request for comment.
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