<div dir="ltr">
<h1 class="gmail-single_title">Targeting the police and protecting thieves: Israel’s efforts to spread chaos in the Gaza Strip</h1>
<p class="gmail-single_date">Saturday 4-January-2025 - <font size="1"><a href="https://english.palinfo.com/reports/2025/01/04/331659/">https://english.palinfo.com/reports/2025/01/04/331659/</a></font></p>
<div class="gmail-featured_image"><img width="460" height="460" src="https://english.palinfo.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/police.jpg" class="gmail-attachment-post-thumbnail gmail-size-post-thumbnail gmail-wp-post-image" alt="" style="margin-right: 0px;"> </div>
<div class="gmail-shareArea">
<div class="gmail-picshare">
<div class="et_pb_code_inner">
<div class="gmail-social_home">
<div class="gmail-social_home_inner">
<div class="gmail-social_home_wrapper"><div class="gmail-ETFont gmail-social_home_item gmail-social_home_item1"><a href="https://english.palinfo.com/reports/2025/01/04/331659/#"><span class="gmail-social_home_icon"><i class="gmail-fab gmail-fa-facebook-f"></i></span></a></div><div class="gmail-ETFont gmail-social_home_item gmail-social_home_item2"><a href="https://english.palinfo.com/reports/2025/01/04/331659/#"><span class="gmail-social_home_icon"><i class="gmail-fa-brands gmail-fa-twitter"></i></span></a></div><div class="gmail-FontAw gmail-social_home_item gmail-social_home_item4"><a href="https://english.palinfo.com/reports/2025/01/04/331659/#"><span class="gmail-social_home_icon"><i class="gmail-fa-brands gmail-fa-whatsapp"></i></span></a></div></div><div class="gmail-FontAw gmail-social_home_item gmail-social_home_item5"><a href="https://english.palinfo.com/reports/2025/01/04/331659/#"><span class="gmail-social_home_icon"><i class="gmail-fa-brands gmail-fa-telegram"></i></span></a></div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
<div class="gmail-changeSize">
<div class="gmail-zoomInOutNtitle"><div class="gmail-SmallZoomR"><a class="gmail-zoomInOut gmail-increaseFont">+<i class="gmail-fa gmail-fa-font"></i></a> <a class="gmail-zoomInOut gmail-decreaseFont">-<i class="gmail-fa gmail-fa-font"></i></a></div></div></div>
</div>
<div style="margin-top:10px">
<center>
</center>
</div>
<div class="gmail-post_content">
<p>GAZA, (PIC)</p>
<p>Among the qualitative objectives of the Israeli occupation in its
ongoing aggression against the Gaza Strip for the past 15 months is to
spread chaos and security breakdown in all areas and cities. This is
achieved through the direct targeting of Palestinian security forces on
one hand, and by supporting criminal gangs that rob humanitarian aid on
the other. In this way, Israel seeks to replace security and stability
with chaos, coinciding with its daily massacres and the blockade and
starvation of all residents of the Strip.</p>
<p>The commander of the police in Gaza, Major General Mahmoud Salah Abu
Salah, and his deputy, Major General Hossam Mustafa Shahwan, were
martyred due to an Israeli bombing of tents for displaced citizens in
the Mawasi of Khan Yunis in the besieged Strip On Thursday. This was
part of an Israeli crime that resulted in the deaths of 11 martyrs,
including women and children, in addition to 15 injured.</p>
<p>According to information gathered by the Palestinian Center for Human
Rights in Khan Yunis, at 1:15 AM on Thursday, January 2, 2025, the
occupation’s planes attacked the tents of displaced persons with no less
than five missiles in two areas approximately 200 meters apart in the
Ihsan camp in the Attar area, southwest of the Mawasi of Khan Yunis,
leading to the deaths of Major General Mahmoud Salah and his assistant,
Major General Hossam Shahwan.</p>
<p><strong>Attempt to spread chaos<br></strong>The Ministry of Interior
and National Security in Gaza announced the assassination of Abu Salah
and Shahwan on Thursday morning while “they were performing their
humanitarian and national duty in serving our Palestinian people amid
the catastrophic conditions caused by the Israeli aggression, which also
led to the martyrdom of several citizens due to the airstrike.”</p>
<p>The statement said: “Major General Mahmoud Salah ascends as a martyr
in the field of serving our people, crowning his life with the medal of
martyrdom after 30 years of work in the Palestinian police force since
its establishment, moving through various responsibilities until
reaching his role as head of the police for the past six years.”</p>
<p>For its part, the Government Media Office (GMO) in the Gaza Strip
confirmed that the escalation of the Israeli occupation’s targeting of
security forces and aid security personnel in the Strip is part of a
clear plan aimed at creating an administrative and governmental vacuum,
spreading chaos and security breakdown in the Gaza Strip, in an attempt
to undermine the resilience of the people and destabilize them.</p>
<p>The GMO said that the number of martyrs among aid security personnel
has risen to 736, reflecting the scale of the crimes committed by the
occupation army, which targets anyone trying to provide assistance and
relief to those affected in Gaza, emphasizing that they continue to
serve the Palestinian people and will not retreat from performing their
national duty. “We will continue to confront all attempts by the
occupation to create chaos, breakdown, and destabilize security in
Gaza.”</p>
<p><strong>A war crime<br></strong>The Palestinian Center for Human
Rights condemned in the strongest terms the crime of assassinating
martyrs Abu Salah and Shahwan, affirming that the continued targeting of
elements and leadership of the civil police by the occupying forces
during the ongoing genocide against Gaza for nearly 15 months, at the
orders of the highest political and military levels, aims to instill
chaos, spread organized crime, exacerbate humanitarian suffering, and
undermine any effort to achieve even the minimum level of security,
which is an integral part of the crime of genocide.</p>
<p>Lawyer Raji Sourani, director of the Palestinian Center for Human
Rights, said, “The blue police (civil) and its leadership are part of
the civil institutions, and attacking them is a war crime. In the
context of the genocide being perpetrated by Israel, the goal of
targeting the police is to plant and spread comprehensive chaos,
insecurity, and the spread of theft amidst famine, poverty, and
displacement, allowing the law of the jungle to prevail and pushing
people to emigrate from the Gaza Strip.”</p>
<p><strong>Resistance committees mourn the martyrs<br></strong>The
Resistance Committees in Palestine mourned the martyrs Salah and
Shahwan, saying that they “ascended on the path to Jerusalem due to a
cowardly Zionist assassination operation carried out by enemy planes on
the tents of displaced persons in the Mawasi of Khan Yunis,” praising
the role of martyr Abu Salah and his honorable journey, saying he
“greatly contributed to building the Palestinian police force according
to a Palestinian national doctrine and protecting the resistance’s
back.”</p>
<p>The Resistance Committees added in a statement that the martyr Major
General Abu Salah established the foundations of security, stability,
and community and civil peace despite limited resources, persecution,
assassinations, and repeated targeting of the police force and its
personnel.</p>
<p>They noted that the assassination of Salah and Shahwan and the
targeting of the Palestinian civil police, which has not stopped
throughout the aggression and genocide in Gaza, aims solely to spread
chaos and destroy the national and community fabric and civil peace to
impose malicious Zionist agendas and plans in Gaza, asserting that
“despite the assassinations, persecution, and targeting of the police
force, it will remain the strong shield, the fortified fortress, and the
original support for our people and their valiant resistance.”</p>
<p><strong>Protecting thieves<br></strong>While the occupation army
targets the leadership and elements of the Palestinian security forces
responsible for maintaining security and establishing order in the
Strip, criminal gangs occasionally emerge, exploiting the difficult
living conditions of the population amid the genocide. They engage in
stealing humanitarian aid, which represents the only lifeline for the
people of the Strip due to the starvation and blockade policies imposed
on them since the war began.</p>
<p>In areas near the Israeli security fence east of the Gaza Strip,
adjacent to places where occupation forces intrude, these gangs take
shelter to cut off humanitarian aid routes and seize it, contributing to
the famine suffered by the southern part of the Strip, where the
highest population density is concentrated, as well as the besieged
northern part.</p>
<p><strong>Organized crime<br></strong>This crisis has deepened with the
emergence of gangs practicing “organized crime”; the occupation has
contributed to their formation and spread by targeting security teams
made up of security and tribal elements to protect the aid, creating a
vacuum that allowed them to expand and commit their crimes without fear.</p>
<p>The notorious reputation of this dangerous gang has spread in
southern Gaza, and Gazans agree that they and the occupation are “two
sides of the same coin,” sharing in “increasing their suffering and
torment.” In previous statements by the Palestinian Ministry of Interior
in the Gaza Strip, it confirmed that it had monitored communications
between these gangs and the occupation to direct their tasks and provide
them with security cover from Israeli internal security officers (Shin
Bet).</p>
<p>The GMO announced that these gangs have caused the martyrdom of a
large number of police and security team members who risk their lives to
protect aid trucks.</p>
<p>Hamas and security, factional, and community circles in Gaza accuse
these gangs of being linked and collaborating with the occupation for
their mutual benefit of theft and creating chaos while destabilizing
security and stability on the home front.</p>
</div>
</div>