Remember the wrangling over the Gaza war's casualty count, as Hamas and Israel argued over the definition of civilians?
Now, Hamas confirmed that there's really no distinction between civilian police and "the resistance" groups who attack Israel. Time writes:
Referring to both the uniformed police and the plainclothes Internal Security, one civilian says, "They're all Qassam." The government does little to deny it. "Many of the Qassam operate within both the Qassam brigades and the Internal Security," Interior Ministry spokesman Ehab al-Ghossain tells TIME. "In our laws, we do not prevent any resistance fighter from joining the police or a security service, provided that he is committed to the rules and regulations of the department he belongs to . . . We make sure that their activities, outside of their official jobs, remain separate."
The lines are going to become even more blurred now that Hamas is laying the groundwork for what many Gazans expect to be mandatory conscription.