Hamas Planned to Use Displacement Camps as Cover to Escape

The IDF revealed today (Monday) an internal Hamas document describing how the terror organization planned to plant explosive devices in the areas of displaced persons' camps in the Gaza Strip, as part of its preparations to protect the organization's leadership and its terrorists and move them out of areas where the IDF was expected to operate. This was done while endangering and exploiting the lives of the civilian population in the area, despite knowing that these actions were likely to harm civilians.

According to the IDF, the document was written in April 2024, and notes that Hamas' engineering department proposed planting explosive devices around the displaced persons camps and detonating them as IDF forces approached, to create panic that would serve as a smoke screen for its terrorists to escape.

In the document, Hamas proposed an additional method of planting explosive devices along routes and roads used, or likely to be used, by residents of the Gaza Strip, as part of an attempt to slow the advance of IDF forces in the area. It was also proposed to fire stun grenades inside the camps to create chaos and panic, so that Hamas terrorists hiding in the area could flee.

The IDF stated that “this is further evidence that Hamas is willing to endanger the lives of the civilian population in the Gaza Strip in order to advance its terror activity.”