In Gaza, Hamas says it's back in control

updated 11:38 p.m. ET Jan. 23, 2009

GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip - Bearded Hamas leaders on Friday delivered an envelope with five crisp $100 bills to a veiled woman whose house was damaged during Israel's invasion of Gaza, the first of promised relief payments by the militant group.

In another part of the territory, a bulldozer cleared rubble and filled in a bomb crater where a week before a top Hamas leader had been killed in an Israeli air strike.

Since a truce took hold this week, ending Israel's three-week onslaught, Gaza's Hamas rulers have declared victory and gone out of their way to show they are in control.

They have pledged $52 million of their own funds to help repair lives, the money divvied up by category. The veiled woman received compensation for her two-story home in the northern town of Beit Lahiya.

Hamas, believed to be funded by donations from the Muslim world and Iran, has promised $52 million in emergency relief. This would include $1,300 for a death in the family, $650 for an injury, $5,200 for a destroyed house and $2,600 for a damaged house, he said, adding that these are not yet compensation payments, which Hamas promises will follow.

More than 4,000 houses were destroyed and about 20,000 damaged, according to independent estimates.

"We are in control and we are the winner," Hamas legislator Mushir al-Masri declared this week, after attending the funeral of four Hamas gunmen.

Fight or negotiate?
But Israeli strikes destroyed all of Hamas' security compounds and most government buildings. Its top two leaders, strongman Mahmoud Zahar and Gaza Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh, have not yet appeared in public.

Israel claims to have killed more than 700 Hamas fighters, while the militants say they lost about 280 armed men, the vast majority members of the police force killed in surprise bombings on the first day of the war.

But beyond the losses, Hamas is wrestling with a fateful choice — whether to keep fighting and drive Gaza deeper into poverty and suffering or moderate in exchange for open borders and a measure of stability.

Gaza had buckled under a tight border closure by Israel and Egypt for 19 months, suffering increasing shortages, and the war only heightened the misery.

Video   Hamas: Obama 'will make same mistakes as Bush' Jan. 23: President Obama vows to seek peace in the Mideast, but Hamas militants say his approach will fail. NBC's Richard Engel reports from Beirut. MSNBC

On Thursday, hundreds lined up with blue gas canisters along the main north-south road, near the town of Deir el-Balah, after word spread that cooking gas was being distributed.

Hamad Abu Shamla, 24, waited for seven hours, only to leave empty-handed. The unemployed carpenter — he lost his job to the blockade — said he last had cooking gas five months ago, and that he, his wife and four children have mostly been living on canned food and bread since then.

He said he had already promised his family a steaming plate of couscous for lunch, and was sad to return home and disappoint them.

"We build our hopes on God," he said, when asked about his future. "We don't know what to do. We are empty-handed ... and we don't know what to do."

Money for rebuilding
Hamas would need huge sums to fund reconstruction — some $2 billion according to first estimates — but the international community for now refuses to funnel the money directly to the militants.

Yet Hamas has rebuffed proposals that it set up a unity government with its moderate West Bank rivals, led by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. It is also cool to demands that Abbas' troops or foreign border monitors be deployed to prevent weapons smuggling into Gaza.

Israel and Egypt, which have kept Gaza's borders closed since Hamas seized the territory by force in June 2007, say they won't open the gates unless Hamas relents.

Before the war, Hamas was able to soften the pain of the blockade because weapons, cash and commercial goods were coming in through hundreds of tunnels under the Gaza-Egypt border. Israel says the shipments included explosives and rockets Hamas has been firing at southern Israel.

Israel bombed many tunnels during the war, though reporters have seen smugglers resume operating in some and rebuild others.

MORE FROM MIDEAST & N. AFRICA

Mideast & N. Africa Section Front

Israel, Hamas near prisoner swap deal Newsweek: Reporter's ordeal in Tehran prison U.K. begins inquiry on Iraq war Amended Iraq election law still angers Sunnis Iran begins war games to protect nuclear sites Iraq PM ramps up Baathist attacks before vote Mideast & N. Africa Section Front   Add Mideast & N. Africa headlines to your news reader: