Gazans Flood The Streets To Protest Hamas As IDF Operations Intensify

Anti-Hamas protests erupted in Khan Yunis, Gaza, on Monday as the Israel Defense Forces intensified operations in Gaza and issued an evacuation order for the city.

Thousands of Gazans took to the streets shouting anti-Hamas chants, according to Khalil Sayegh, a Gazan Christian activist.

“This is a clear rejection by the public of Hamas’ both government and armed group existence in Gaza,” Sayegh told The Daily Wire.

“For 18 years, Hamas has suppressed any dissent and used the pretext of ‘resistance’ to justify its authoritarian crackdown,” Sayegh continued. “Nonetheless, after 18 years of destruction, the people can tell that ‘resistance’ is only leading to more destruction while Hamas remains indifferent to their pain.”

Ihab Hassan, the director of the Human Rights Project, shared a video of the protesters chanting “Hamas out, out!”

????BREAKING: Massive anti-Hamas protests have erupted—this time in Khan Yunis, southern Gaza. Protesters chanting, “Hamas out, out!”

DOWN WITH HAMAS! pic.twitter.com/VA4lxDI8iP

— Ihab Hassan (@IhabHassane) May 19, 2025

Sayegh said that Gazans are “reclaiming their voices against media and corrupt ‘pro-Palestine’ NGOs, which have fostered a class of cowards too afraid to speak out against Hamas.”

Sayegh, who left Gaza as a teenager due to persecution by Hamas, has been a prominent voice opposing the war. He lost both his father and sister during the conflict.

The protests come after the IDF issued an evacuation order for Gazans in Khan Younis, Bani Suheila, and the Abasan suburbs to move towards the coast. The order is the first evacuation order in Israel’s new “Operation Gideon’s Chariots” offensive. 

Since Friday, hundreds of Hamas targets have been struck, including anti-tank missile launch posts, weapons storage facilities, booby-trapped structures, tunnels, and more, according to the Israeli Defense Forces. 

Similar protests have been taking place in Gaza sporadically since March, with Gazans taking to the streets to call for the remaining Israeli hostages to be released and for Hamas to end its rule.

Odai al-Rabei, a 22-year-old Gazan who was involved in anti-Hamas protests, was abducted from Gaza City, tortured, and murdered by terrorists in March before being returned to his family home, according to his family.

Graphic images of al-Rabei’s mutilated body went viral on social media, showing the extent of the torture by Hamas’s al-Qassam brigades terrorists.

Humanitarian aid trucks entered Gaza for the first time in nearly three months on Monday, following an order from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as President Donald Trump’s distribution plan prepares to go into effect.

“On the recommendation of the IDF and based on the operational need to enable the expansion of the military operation to defeat Hamas, Israel will allow a basic quantity of food to be brought in for the population in order to make certain that no starvation crisis develops in the Gaza Strip,” Netanyahu’s office said in a statement.

The American-backed group, the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) is expected to begin distributing humanitarian aid in Gaza by the end of the month, but requested that international aid groups be allowed to resume deliveries immediately, Jewish News Syndicate reported.

U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee announced President Donald Trump’s humanitarian aid plan earlier this month.

“President Trump has made very clear that one of the most urgent things that needs to happen is humanitarian aid into Gaza,” Huckabee said. “President Trump wants food distributed in Gaza safely and efficiently.”

Under the plan, Israel will be involved in providing military security but will not be tasked with bringing the food into Gaza or distributing it, Huckabee said. 

“Their role will remain on the perimeter as is necessary to make sure that those who are bringing the food in and distributing the food are kept safe and out of harm’s way in the midst of a war zone,” the ambassador said.