Guns, Flour, and Blood: How Israel Uses Aid and Militias to Legitimize Mass Violence in Gaza
Strategic Gambles, Proxy Wars, and Power Vacuums
In Gaza, even hunger comes with crosshairs. Along dusty aid corridors, where Palestinians once waited for food, they now brace for gunfire. Some days, it comes from Israeli tanks; other days, from a new and equally dangerous source: a militia of local gunmen armed by Israel itself.
At the center of this unfolding disaster is Yasser Abu Shabab, a name few outside southern Gaza knew a year ago. Once a small-time smuggler and convicted criminal, Abu Shabab now commands the Popular Forces, a 100- to 300-man militia of Bedouin fighters armed and protected by Israel.
His men loot convoys, extort starving families, and fire on crowds—part of the IDF’s “Operation Salted Fish,” which has killed 549 civilians near aid sites since May 2025, according to local reports. Gazans on social media call him a “traitor” and a “thief.” In June, his own family publicly disowned him for collaborating with Israel.
Israel claims this proxy force helps curb Hamas, with the U.S.-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) caught in the middle. But what’s emerging is more dangerous than another security experiment. Israel isn’t just escalating violence—it’s seeding Gaza’s next war.
Who Is Yasser Abu Shabab?
For most of his life, Yasser Abu Shabab was no political actor—just a Rafah-born criminal with a knack for survival. Born in 1993, he grew up in the Hamashah clan, part of the Tarabin Bedouin tribe, whose networks span Gaza, Sinai, and southern Israel. Dropping out of school early, he built a reputation trafficking drugs, cigarettes, and contraband through Gaza’s borders.
In 2015, his career caught up with him. Hamas sentenced him to 25 years in Asda Prison for drug trafficking and violent crimes. For nearly a decade, he vanished from public life—until the chaos of Israel’s military campaign in Gaza, which began in 2023. As Israeli airstrikes hammered Gaza’s infrastructure, including prisons, Abu Shabab escaped custody.
By early 2024, he had assembled a small fighting force—fellow escaped prisoners, disaffected clan members, and low-level gunmen with no clear ideology. What they lacked in numbers, they made up for in one thing Israel needed: willingness.
By mid-2024, Abu Shabab’s Popular Forces had taken shape: a blend of ex-convicts, former Palestinian Authority officers, and Tarabin clansmen. Notorious figures like Shadi Soufi (a convicted murderer) and Essam Soliman Nabahin (linked by Israeli media to ISIS networks in Sinai) joined his ranks.
The Shin Bet supplied rifles—approximately 200 Kalashnikovs and thousands of rounds of ammunition, according to Israeli security sources—some allegedly looted from Hamas stockpiles.
The group’s operations quickly expanded:
Ambushing Hamas units
Raiding aid trucks at Kerem Shalom
Inspecting buildings on behalf of the IDF
Enforcing control around GHF aid corridors
Social media reports from June 2025 describe 70 trucks looted in one night, with extortion fees of $50 to $200 levied at makeshift checkpoints. Local anger exploded. Gazans labeled him a “Zionist tool.” His own clan disowned him.
Hamas has made at least two attempts on his life, killing his brother in 2024 and narrowly missing him earlier this year. Yet, despite mounting local hatred and warnings from Israeli security officials, Abu Shabab’s militia continues to operate—armed, funded, and politically untouchable.
Israel’s Strategic Gamble
On June 5, 2025, Prime Minister Netanyahu publicly confirmed what had been whispered: Israel is arming Gaza-based clan militias to “weaken Hamas from within.” Among them, Abu Shabab’s Popular Forces stand as the most visible and dangerous. The calculus is blunt: suppress Hamas with Palestinian fighters, minimize Israeli casualties, and fracture Gaza’s social fabric.
It’s a familiar pattern—seen before in Iraq’s Sunni Awakening militias, Afghan warlord networks, and Lebanon’s South Lebanon Army.
The formula remains unchanged: find a local strongman, arm him, and let him run dirty operations the state doesn’t want to own. Since 2024, according to Israeli media leaks, Shin Bet has supplied weapons, radios, and tactical support—all under the banner of “securing humanitarian corridors” and “fighting Hamas sabotage cells” near GHF aid sites.
Predictably, the results speak for themselves. UN officials, Gazan civilians, and even IDF soldiers now describe Abu Shabab’s fighters as little more than a state-protected criminal gang: looting aid trucks, extorting civilians, running rackets in Rafah, and using violence to intimidate rival clans.
Prominent Israeli figures have sounded alarms. Avigdor Lieberman compared the policy to “giving a loaded gun to a bank robber and asking him to guard the vault.” Yair Lapid called it “reckless and shortsighted,” pointing to Abu Shabab’s criminal history and suspected (but unconfirmed) ties to Sinai-based jihadist networks.
Even within IDF Southern Command, officers acknowledge “no long-term political logic” and warn of “creating an armed actor that neither Israel nor Hamas can control.” Meanwhile, the U.S. remains silent, even as $50 million in GHF funding flows through corridors where Abu Shabab’s fighters operate with near-total impunity, according to Middle East Eye.
For now, Israel’s strategy holds: Let Palestinians police Palestinians. Let chaos delay political negotiations. Let hunger and violence mask the occupation. This strategy has been tried before, and history shows us a clear pattern: proxies don’t stay proxies forever.
The Militia Behind the Aid Lines
The Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), marketed as a U.S.-backed humanitarian breakthrough, is now inseparable from the security disaster unfolding around it. The GHF is supported not only by the United States but also by Israel, likely including Israeli intelligence.
At the heart of its operations are the Secure Distribution Sites (SDS)—supposed safe zones for aid delivery. In practice, these zones have become kill boxes. Abu Shabab’s Popular Forces, now with an estimated 300 fighters, patrol these corridors under Israeli military authorization. Officially, they’re there to “secure aid convoys from looters.” In reality, they’re looting the convoys themselves.
According to UN officials and Palestinian media, they’ve diverted hundreds of tons of food and medical supplies. Aid truck drivers report routine extortion, with some told to pay bribes or risk losing their cargo. In October 2024, 80 out of 100 aid trucks were looted in a single week, according to local aid monitors. Civilians describe being shot at while queuing for food.
The Gaza Health Ministry and Haaretz link at least 549 civilian deaths near aid sites since May 2025 to IDF and militia fire. GHF leadership remains silent, and American contractors coordinating aid logistics refuse to answer questions about who controls their security corridors.
The U.S. State Department, when pressed, refers all inquiries to Israel. Jonathan Whittall, a senior UN humanitarian coordinator, called the situation “grand larceny with military oversight.” Meanwhile, the GHF continues operating within this securitized architecture, funded by U.S. taxpayers and guarded—directly or indirectly—by Israel’s latest proxy militia.
The Life Cycle of a Proxy
Israel’s embrace of Abu Shabab follows a well-worn path. From the South Lebanon Army to Iraqi Awakening militias to Afghan warlords, the story is the same: empower a violent actor to solve a short-term problem, then lose control when circumstances change.
For now, Abu Shabab serves his purpose: harass Hamas, control desperate civilians, and manage the optics around aid distribution. But the limits are already clear. Other Gaza clans refuse to align with him, and his fighters face open hostility from civilians. Hamas continues targeting his men, making it clear they see him as more than a nuisance.
If Israeli support falters, Abu Shabab’s options are limited. He could turn to other sponsors. Some regional analysts point to recent Egyptian intelligence outreach. Others speculate about possible future support from the UAE, given its growing footprint in regional security affairs.
Alternatively, he could pivot from collaborator to insurgent, rebranding himself as an anti-Israel populist once the guns and money stop flowing. Either way, the outcome is predictable: another armed faction in an already crowded, ungovernable Gaza. Another pretext for Israel to wage the next war.
Trapped Between Occupation and Warlordism
For civilians in Rafah, there’s no meaningful distinction between airstrikes, snipers, or the gunmen at Abu Shabab’s checkpoints. Residents report shakedowns, forced bribes ranging from $50 to $200, and live fire on aid seekers. Families hide their sons to avoid forced recruitment. Anonymous graffiti brands Abu Shabab “Israel’s dog.”
Leaflets urge silent boycotts of GHF sites, but organized resistance is rare. Hamas is too stretched, battered by months of Israeli assault. Other clans, wary of being seen as collaborators or targets themselves, stay out of the fight. One Rafah woman summed it up in a viral social media post: “We dodge snipers for bread, then pay Abu Shabab to live.”
Meanwhile, the GHF continues to operate, its American staff and contractors moving supplies through corridors where Israeli snipers and Abu Shabab’s gunmen patrol side by side. For Gaza’s civilians, survival now means navigating a warlord economy where aid is weaponized, hunger is policed, and every trip for flour carries the risk of death.
Building the Next Enemy by Design
For Israel, Abu Shabab is a tool, not a partner—a disposable solution for an intractable problem, another layer of manufactured chaos to shield the occupation. But the endgame is clear. Sooner or later, Abu Shabab will outlive his usefulness. His fighters will become too unruly, too independent, or too embarrassing for Israel to explain.
When that day comes, he’ll be rebranded—not as a former collaborator, but as a new terrorist threat. Israel will point to instability in Rafah, blaming attacks on aid routes, escalating violence, or internal disorder. The Western press will carry the narrative, and another campaign will begin. Palestinians—already trapped between siege, starvation, and warlordism—will once again bear the cost.
This isn’t a security failure. It’s not blowback. It’s policy.
Israel doesn’t need Hamas to justify its wars on Gaza. When one enemy fades, a vacuum is created that is inevitably filled by the next. Abu Shabab is simply the latest to fill the void, and we can confidently say: he won’t be the last.
The Current State of Affairs
Recently, significant events have taken place in the region.
The Israelis have begun a bombing campaign in Damascus, Syria.
The Hamas-run Court of the Military Judiciary Authority, located in Gaza, levied charges against Abu Shabab. They gave him 10 days to turn himself in to answer for the following charges:
Treason
Collaborating with Hostile Entities
Forming an Armed Gang
Armed Rebellion
The courts have warned that he will be tried in his absence if he fails to appear to dispute the allegations. According to a post on Facebook, [Translated by Aljazeera] the Poplar Forces have responded to notification of the court’s order, calling it a "sitcom that doesn’t frighten us, nor does it frighten any free man who loves his homeland and its dignity.”
We’re going to do our best to stay on top of the situation as it continues to evolve, and we will continue providing updates and in-depth analysis as more information becomes available.