Report: IDF aids anti-Hamas militia in Gaza City clash across Yellow Line

Saudi paper says Israeli drones struck targets as fighting erupted in the Tuffah neighborhood.

By Batya Jerenberg, World Israel News

An anti-Hamas militia crossed the Yellow Line in Gaza City on Sunday and received assistance from the IDF during a clash with Hamas forces, according to a report in the Saudi newspaper Asharq Al-Awsat.

The armed group, led by Rami Halas and based in the Shejaiya neighborhood of eastern Gaza City — an area under Israeli control — advanced into the populated Tuffah neighborhood in the city’s northeast, the report said.

Once inside, the militia came under fire from Hamas operatives and allied fighters. The exchange of gunfire reportedly lasted about 20 minutes, during which IDF drones struck several houses in the area.

Following the clashes, the militia retreated back across the Yellow Line to safety.

Sources cited by Asharq Al-Awsat said Halas’ group has recently escalated its operations in Gaza City, including forcing residents of the Tuffah and Daraj neighborhoods to leave.

The report also claimed that a sniper attack on Saturday in Shejaiya, initially attributed to Israel and which killed an alleged Hamas operative, was in fact carried out by one of Halas’ men.

It said the militia has killed two Hamas operatives over the past 10 days.

Halas is affiliated with several armed “popular forces” that have emerged across Gaza during the war, with groups operating in Rafah and Khan Yunis in the south, Gaza City in the center, and Beit Lahiya in the north.

These militias were formed in an effort to challenge Hamas’ control of the enclave and say they seek peace with Israel.

Some, including Halas’ group, are reportedly led by figures linked to Fatah, the nationalist movement that dominates the Palestinian Authority.

The earliest such militia was established in Rafah in May 2024 by Yasser Abu Shabab, a member of a powerful Bedouin clan spanning southern Gaza, the Israeli Negev and Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula.

Abu Shabab was killed last month by members of a local clan after his forces arrested a few of their relatives and he refused their request to release them.

His deputy, Ghassan al-Dahini, took over the militia after his death.

Hamas has labeled all members of the militias criminals and traitors, warning their families to publicly disavow them or face repercussions.

While clashes between Hamas and rival militias have been reported intermittently, direct IDF involvement in inter-Arab fighting inside Gaza has rarely been acknowledged.