Gaza Protest Movement Has a Message for Hamas

In the narrow alleys of Jabalia and the sun-scorched streets of Beit Lahia, something rare is unfolding in Gaza: open defiance. Not just of Israeli bombardments or international indifference—but of Hamas. For three consecutive days in late March, hundreds of Palestinians, many of them young men, marched through northern Gaza chanting, “We want to live!” and “Hamas out!” The scenes, captured briefly in shaky phone videos, exposed a breach in the longstanding narrative of unity under siege.

“Our leaders live abroad,” says Ahmed. “We live under drones.”

Sources on the ground tell Moment that smaller protests and acts of dissent followed and then accelerated on April 16, when hundreds of residents marched through the northern town of Beit Lahia. They called for Hamas, which has governed the Gaza Strip since 2007, to step down and demanded an end to the war. Many blamed Hamas for prolonging the fighting and deepening Gaza’s misery. Individuals affiliated with Hamas, disguised in civilian clothing, attempted to infiltrate the demonstrators and display pro-Hamas banners. Protesters pushed them back, removed the banners and forced the Hamas loyalists to flee.

The protests grew on April 22, as crowds filled the streets of Beit Lahia, again chanting, “Hamas out!” and “No to terrorism, yes to peace!” Some waved Egyptian flags, backing calls for Hamas to disarm and stop the war. On April 27, hundreds of women and children marched through Beit Lahia. They held signs that read “Enough displacement and homelessness” and “Stop the bloodshed.” Protesters shouting the slogan “Bedna Na’aeesh!” (“We want to live!”) also marched in Gaza City and Khan Yunis, fueled by anger over the war, hunger and the fate of hostages.

“This is our historic opportunity,” says Kareem Jouda, a 29-year-old whose home was destroyed in an air strike. “The war has crushed my future and taken the dearest people from me. Hamas’s rule has always been oppressive and unjust—we were suffering under it long before October 7.”

The protests come at a moment of profound exhaustion and political paralysis. Cease-fire talks have stalled. Aid has all but ended since March. The number of dead keeps rising. On Monday, at least 27 Palestinians were killed in Israeli strikes, according to local health officials quoted by the Associated Press and other sources. One of those airstrikes hit a home in Beit Lahia, killing 10 people in one family.

Yet in this disarray, new voices are demanding not just food and water, but dignity, freedom and accountability.

“The world sees us through the lens of Hamas,” says Khalil Ahmed, a 41-year-old father of three who joined the protests in Beit Lahia. “But we are not them. We are a people held hostage—twice.”

While some Qatari-funded outlets, including Al Jazeera and The New Arab, have cautiously acknowledged the demonstrations, their limited engagement has drawn criticism from activists hoping to amplify calls for change. For example, in March, demonstrators say they tried to seek out Al Jazeera’s correspondents to share their demands of Hamas, but they were reportedly told the crews had taken shelter inside Indonesia Hospital during that three-day period of unrest. 

Hamas, designated a terrorist organization by the United States and the European Union, has held power in Gaza since it violently ousted the Palestinian Authority in 2007. Its monopoly on power has meant that dissent—even expressed in private conversations—has often been dangerous. Before October 7, speaking out could mean arrest. After October 7, it can and has meant death.

On March 29, Gaza-based activists reported that Hamas militants abducted and tortured 22-year-old protester Uday Al-Rubaie for four hours before killing him—simply for chanting “We want to live!” during a demonstration in Tel al-Hawa, a once-upscale neighborhood in southern Gaza City. Al-Rubaie, who had also criticized Hamas leadership online, was taken from his home after the protest.

And yet, in the ruins of this latest war, the fear is cracking. Both Jouda and Ahmed describe a growing boldness among their neighbors. “Yes, I’m afraid,” Ahmed admits. “But fear has become our daily bread. And silence is a slower death.”

Gazan’s grievances are layered. War, yes—but also water shortages, constant surveillance, economic collapse and the stifling presence of a Hamas leadership many now view as unaccountable and insulated. “Our leaders live abroad,” says Ahmed. “We live under drones.”

Perhaps even more important than the protests themselves has been the response of Gaza’s powerful clan networks. In a rare joint statement issued in March of 2024 the families and clans of the southern governorates declared their opposition not only to the Israeli occupation but also to what they called Hamas’s “unilateral decisions and ideological exclusion.” The message was unambiguous: Hamas is no longer synonymous with Palestinian resistance.

In Gaza, clans are more than kinship groups—they are pillars of social order, often outlasting governments. The Doghmush, Helles, and al-Shawwa families, among others, control entire neighborhoods, influence aid flows and mediate disputes. Some have clashed with Hamas in the past, over everything from smuggling routes to extrajudicial arrests. Last spring, Hamas fighters shot and killed the mukhtar (leader) of the Doghmush clan in Gaza City. The clan’s retaliation—declaring Hamas members as legitimate targets—marked one of the most direct tribal challenges to Hamas authority in years.

The emerging triangle of pressure—from civilians, clans and exhausted fighters—has created a moment unlike any in recent memory. And while Hamas has dismissed the protests as Israeli manipulation, its usual tools of repression seem weakened. Some suggest its control is simply stretched too thin. Others believe the group is recalibrating, unsure how to deal with a rebellion from within and spilling onto its own streets.

What will replace it remains uncertain. While no formal opposition party has consolidated power, figures like Mohammed Dahlan, the exiled former Gaza security chief with deep ties to the United Arab Emirates, continue to loom in the background. Meanwhile, senior officials in the Palestinian Authority are taking tentative steps toward succession planning. This pertains to leadership of the West Bank for now, and potentially for the Gaza Strip in the future. On April 24, the Palestinian Authority in Ramallah created a vice presidency role within the PLO, a step seen as paving the way for leadership succession. Two days later, President Mahmoud Abbas appointed Hussein al-Sheikh, a senior Fatah official, as vice president. Al-Sheikh has often been seen as a potential successor to the 89-year-old Abbas.

[Further reading: “After Abbas: A Special Report”] 

One vision for the future comes from thinkers like Omar Shaban Ismail, director of PalThink for Strategic Studies, a nonprofit think tank in Gaza. He sees promise in a new cease-fire framework advanced by Egypt and Qatar, which he says has gained rare international and Arab consensus. “The Palestinian Authority is the internationally recognized representative of the Palestinian people,” Shaban says. “No donor will support Gaza’s reconstruction without a legitimate government in place.” But he warned that implementation hinges on a cease-fire—and that the PA must undergo substantial reform to regain trust in the Strip.

Shaban believes the current war is reshaping political imagination. “This war is redefining everything—resistance, leadership, the very meaning of solidarity,” he says. “And Palestinians are starting to ask new questions.”

Others, like former PA official Riyad Awad, see no easy way out: “Right now, no one governs Gaza—not Hamas, not the PA, not any organized authority. Israel holds the reins through its military operations.”

Awad describes a population caught in limbo, with no clear exit. “There may be small cease-fires, but both Hamas and Israel benefit from prolonged conflict. Neither side is ready to let go.”

He also points to the growing risk of displacement, fueled by pressure and incentives for Gazans to leave. “But Gaza’s people are rooted,” he says. “They’ve been through this before. They will not easily be uprooted.”

If there is one constant in the rubble of Gaza, it is resilience. Not the romantic kind, but the weary, deliberate kind—the kind that refuses to normalize despair.

“We love life,” says Jouda. “We just want to be allowed to live it.”

Whether these protests mark the beginning of a political shift or are soon extinguished by the realities of war and surveillance is unknown. But for now, they are a rupture. A beginning, perhaps, of Gaza speaking for itself.

Waseem Abu Mahadi is a Palestinian journalist, writer and peace activist from Gaza, currently based in Cairo.

Jacob Wirtschafter is a Jewish American journalist who splits his time between Los Angeles and Istanbul.

Above image: Children carry a banner that reads “Our children deserve peace—not destruction,” at an anti-war, anti-Hamas protest in Beit Lahia on April 27, 2025. The photo has being circulated widely on social media; the photographer does not want to be credited for security reasons.