i24 News – Hours after the release of the final Israeli hostages under the US-brokered ceasefire, Hamas gunmen executed more than 30 Palestinians accused of treason and collaboration, in what security sources and witnesses described as a brutal bid to reassert control over the war-torn Gaza Strip.

According to various reports and videos, at least 33 people were shot dead across several neighborhoods after being accused of spying for Israel or belonging to rival armed groups.

Videos shared on social media showed masked fighters forcing men to kneel before executing them at close range, as crowds gathered, chanting “Allahu Akbar.” Reuters and other outlets were unable to independently verify the footage or its location.

The wave of executions comes as Hamas, weakened by months of Israeli military strikes, cautiously redeploys members of its Qassam Brigades into Gaza’s streets.

The executions took place just hours after US President Donald Trump, en route from Jerusalem to Sharm el-Sheikh for ceasefire talks, said he had authorized Hamas to “manage internal security in Gaza as it sees fit” under the current agreement.

A nephew of late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat has returned to the West Bank after four years of self-exile, outlining a roadmap to secure peace in Gaza with Hamas transforming into a political party and declaring his readiness to help govern.

Nasser al-Qudwa, a prominent critic of the current Palestinian leadership, also urged “a serious confrontation of corruption in this country.” He said President Mahmoud Abbas’ Fatah Movement needed deep reform and must do more to counter Jewish settler violence in the West Bank.

“The first duty … is to regain confidence of the street – something that we lost – and we have to be brave enough and say that we don’t have it anymore, and without it, frankly, it’s useless,” Qudwa told Reuters in an interview.

Qudwa left the West Bank in 2021 after he was expelled from Fatah, the movement founded by his uncle, over his decision to field his own list in elections, defying Abbas who cancelled the vote.

Abbas, 89, readmitted Qudwa to Fatah last week, after offering an amnesty for expelled members.

PA PRESSES FOR A ROLE IN GAZA

His return coincides with renewed pressure on Abbas to enact long-delayed reforms in the Palestinian Authority as it presses for a role in Gaza, lost to Hamas in 2007, despite Israeli objections and being sidelined in President Donald Trump’s plan.

Gaza’s future governance has moved into focus as Trump has declared the war over. The next phase must tackle demands that Hamas disarm and end its rule in Gaza, from where it launched the October 7, 2023 attacks on Israel that ignited the war.

Although light on detail, Trump’s proposal foresees an internationally supervised technocratic Palestinian committee running Gaza, and the deployment of an international force that would support a new Palestinian police.

Depending on how Trump’s plans evolve, Palestinian analysts say Qudwa could have a role, citing his ties to Arab states, his contacts with Hamas, standing as Arafat’s nephew and his Gazan origins: he was born in Khan Younis.

“If I’m needed, I’m not going to hesitate,” Qudwa, 72, said.

URGES HAMAS TRANSFORMATION

Qudwa’s ideas hinge on Hamas committing to ending both administrative and security control over Gaza and putting its weapons under the control of a new governing body. Hamas has said it is willing to play no role in government, but has rejected disarmament.

In return, “the door should be open for them for a political transformation towards a political party,” Qudwa said.

He said existing PA assets in Gaza should be used in a new police force, and that Gaza’s current police could be vetted and used as well.

Hamas should be given assurances.

“Hamas needs to understand that nobody is coming after them, that some of these employees will be given another opportunity, that they will not be assassinated, that there will be an opportunity for them to participate in the political life.”

He said a Palestinian “council of commissioners” could run Gaza. While Abbas could appoint its head, keeping a link between the West Bank and Gaza, Qudwa said he was not suggesting the “return of the (Palestinian) Authority as is to govern Gaza.”

He said that international supervision would be “fine,” but Gaza must be run by Palestinians and they must be able to hold elections, last held in 2006.

Qudwa declined to give details of the corruption that he referred to, but said he was “astonished” at how it had spread. The PA is widely seen as corrupt among Palestinians, opinion polls show.

Political analyst Hani al-Masri said Qudwa could have a role in Gaza but Palestinian factions must first agree on a way forward. “No person alone can play a successful role without consensus,” he said.

“The challenges are great. The most important is Israel, which does not want the PA to return to Gaza.”

(JTA) — What caught Nim Shapira’s eye when videos of New Yorkers tearing down posters of Israeli hostages began circulating in October 2023 wasn’t just the stark affront. It was also the poles the posters had been attached to.

“I recognized every corner,” he said. “This was my neighborhood.”

The filmmaker had never before turned his craft to his identity as an Israeli living in New York. But Shapira immediately began gathering footage about the posters — and about those who felt compelled to put them up, and to tear them down.

His resulting documentary, “Torn,” was first released last year, when about 100 Israelis were still held hostage, out of roughly 250 taken on . Now, with all living hostages released and Hamas agreeing to free the bodies of 28 deceased hostages, too, Shapira — who is entering “Torn” into awards consideration — says its message remains deeply relevant.

We spoke to Shapira on Monday in the hours after 20 hostages were released about what he learned about the poster wars and why his film is still essential viewing.

Sign up here to attend a virtual screening of “Torn” on Thursday at 7 p.m., followed by a conversation with Shapira and others involved in the poster wars in New York City.

JTA: Before Oct. 7, your work did not focus on your Israeli identity. Why did you feel you had to make this movie?

Shapira: I’ve always been vocal for peace. But then, Oct. 7 happened, and the people that were my friends stopped speaking to me because I’m Israeli. It’s like the old saying of: You are the people you’ve been waiting for. I just had to do it. I didn’t want to do this film, and I had to do it.

What did you learn about the people who were tearing down the posters? Were there moments where you felt like you understood what they were thinking?

That’s what I wanted to explore in the film. I don’t justify what they did, and I don’t respect it, but this is a documentary. It’s asking questions. It’s not a film funded by this organization or that organization, or this country, or that country. I’m asking for empathy, and if I’m asking for empathy, I should also have empathy for the other side, and I should also understand their motives.

I would say that the people that tore down the posters live on a spectrum. These were people from in their teens to people that are retired, every ethnicity, every background and every age group. And that’s what strikes me the most. There were so many people without skin in the game that joined this cause of taking down these posters.

Some people that tore down the posters did lose family members in Gaza because of Israeli airstrikes. Some people that tore down the posters — they didn’t read what was on the signs. They were told that this is Israeli propaganda funded by the government, and they thought that it needs to be removed. Some of them are college students that thought it was the cool thing to do. And some are antisemites.

So I don’t want to put a label on the entire group of people that turned out the posters, because there are different scenarios in which posters were torn. In any case, this was an attack on freedom of speech, and this was anti-American. And there are enough lampposts in New York to share their suffering as well.

What do you hope viewers will take away from seeing “Torn”?

Empathy is all about putting yourself in someone else’s shoes. I honestly don’t think that people can put themselves in other people’s shoes, because you can never know what another person is going through, but you can step outside of your own shoes for a quick moment. So that’s all I’m asking.

I’m asking for the people who put on the posters to think about these victims and hostages that did nothing wrong. And I’m also asking for understanding from, let’s say, my side, to understand that the number-one reason why people read down the posters is that the death toll in Gaza kept rising throughout this war.

What has been most surprising about the reception?

I was able to have a film screened in Ivy League universities from Columbia to Harvard to Stanford to NYU. I’m very proud of that. I’m very proud that some of the screenings had people from the encampments. I spoke with American Muslims. I spoke with people from Jordan and from Egypt. I also spoke with Chinese and Venezuelans — I spoke to everyone who came to the screenings. I think maybe the most surprising thing was that there was a Q&A that I couldn’t come to — people just stayed in the theater and talked until the usher told them to leave.

Now there are good reasons to remove hostage posters — all of the living hostages are home. Why is your movie still worth seeing?

For two reasons. First, the hostage families with their loved ones still in Gaza — they are asking for us to stay in the fight. They still need us.

These hostages that were murdered, first kidnapped and then murdered — they are not just Israeli. They are American, and they are also from Nepal, Thailand and Tanzania. They are Christian and Muslim and Buddhists and Muslims and Jews. People from all religions are captive right now because their only sin was to be at the wrong place at the wrong time, and their families deserve to bring them home for a proper burial.

But also, my film is not about Israel or Palestine. My film is about New York and America. I’m dying for the day that the film will not be irrelevant, but we are more tribal and polarized than ever. We exist in different echo chambers and different silos. The poster war did not just tear down the posters, but also tore down the social fabric of the city. We are the most diverse city on the planet, so if we can’t sit down and talk to one another, what are we doing here? We have the biggest Jewish population. We have a huge Muslim population. Antisemitism is at a record high; there’s also Islamophobia that is rising.

But these are not just problems for the Jews or the Muslims. This is a societal problem and the film mostly asks questions. It asks: Can multiple things be true at the same time? Why is empathy a limited resource, and can we have disagreements without dehumanizations? So yes, the film is still much more relevant than ever.

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