- Hamas has tunnels for attacks, smuggling and storage
- Hostage described the network as “a spider web”
- Tunnels stretch for hundreds of kilometers – security sources
JERUSALEM/LONDON, Oct 26 (Portal) – A Hamas tunnel network hundreds of kilometers long and up to 80 meters deep is lurking in Gaza, according to security sources, described by a freed hostage as “a spider’s web” and by an expert referred to as “Vietcong times 10”.
The Palestinian Islamist group has various types of tunnels running beneath the sandy 360-square-kilometer coastal strip and its borders – including attack, smuggling, storage and operational tunnels, Western and Middle Eastern sources familiar with the matter said.
The United States expects Israeli special forces to face an unprecedented challenge as they must fight Hamas militants while trying to avoid killing hostages held underground, a U.S. official said.
US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin noted that Iraq’s nine-month battle to retake the city of Mosul from the Islamic State could prove easier than what awaits the Israelis – probably “a lot of IEDs (improvised explosive devices), a lot.” Booby traps and just a really strenuous activity.
Although Israel has invested heavily in tunnel detection – including a sensor-equipped underground barrier it calls the “Iron Wall” – Hamas is still believed to have functioning tunnels to the outside world.
After the last round of hostilities in 2021, Hamas leader in Gaza Yehya Al-Sinwar said: “They started saying they had destroyed 100 km of Hamas tunnels. I tell you, the tunnels we have in Gaza are over 500 km long. Even if.” Your story is true, they only destroyed 20% of the tunnels.”
Witness to the hostage taking
There was no confirmation of the statement from Sinwar, who is believed to be hiding underground ahead of an expected Israeli ground offensive.
But the estimate of hundreds of kilometers is widely accepted by security analysts, even though the blocked coastal strip is only 40 km (25 miles) long.
Since Israel has full control of air and sea access to Gaza and 59 km of its 72 km land borders – Egypt is 13 km to the south – tunnels are one of the few ways for Hamas to bring in weapons, equipment and people.
While they and other Palestinian groups keep their networks secret, the recently released Israeli hostage, 85-year-old Yocheved Lifshitz, said: “It looked like a spider web, many, many tunnels,” adding: “We went underground for miles. “.”
Hamas believes that, given Israel’s overwhelming military superiority in air and armor, tunnels represent a way to limit some of those advantages by forcing Israeli soldiers to move underground in narrow spaces that Hamas fighters have know well.
An Israeli military spokesman said on Thursday: “I will not go into detail about the number of kilometers of tunnels, but it is a high number, built under schools and residential areas.”
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas called on the United Nations Security Council to intervene, calling for an immediate cessation of “aggression” against Gaza and seeking “a political solution instead of military and security solutions.”
UNDERGROUND CITY
Israel’s heavy airstrikes have caused little damage to tunnel infrastructure, according to Israeli security sources, as Hamas naval commandos were able to launch a sea attack on coastal communities near Gaza this week.
“Although we have been attacking massively for days, the (Hamas) leadership is pretty much intact, as is the command and control ability and even the ability to attempt counterattacks,” said Amir Avivi, a former brigadier general whose senior positions in the Israeli military included the deputy commander of the Gaza Division, which was tasked with fighting tunnels.
“Everywhere in the Gaza Strip there is an entire city underneath, 40 to 50 meters deep. There are bunkers, headquarters and camps, and of course they are connected to more than a thousand missile firing positions.”
Other sources estimated the depth at up to 80 meters.
A Western security source said: “They run for miles. They are made of concrete and are very well made. Think about the Viet Cong ten times. They had years and a lot of money to work with.”
Another security source from one of Israel’s neighboring countries said Hamas’s tunnels from Egypt remained active.
“The supply chain is still intact today. The network involved in the coordination are some Egyptian military officers. It is unclear whether the Egyptian army is aware of this,” he said.
According to two security sources and a trader in the Egyptian city of El Arish, until recently there were still a small number of narrower, deep smuggling tunnels between Egypt and Gaza, but these had almost come to a standstill since the Israel-Hamas war began.
Egyptian officials did not immediately respond to a request for comment. On Wednesday, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi said while inspecting military units in Suez that the army’s task was to secure Egypt’s borders.
LONG GAME
Hamas was founded in Gaza in 1987 and is said to have started digging tunnels in the mid-1990s, when Israel granted Yasser Arafat’s Palestine Liberation Organization a degree of self-rule in Gaza.
The tunnel network is one of the main reasons Hamas is stronger in the Gaza Strip than in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, where Israeli settlements, military bases and surveillance equipment make it harder to get in from Jordan.
Tunneling became easier in 2005 when Israel withdrew its soldiers and settlers from Gaza and when Hamas won power in a 2006 election.
Shortly thereafter, Hamas’s military wing, the Izz el-Deen al-Qassam Brigades, captured Gilad Shalit and killed two other Israeli soldiers after they dug in 600 meters to raid the Kerem Shalom base on the Gaza border .
A year later, Hamas launched a military strike against Arafat’s forces in Gaza by carrying out tunnel attacks.
Although the military tunnels remained off-limits to outsiders, Gaza smugglers at the time boasted of their thinly hidden trade tunnels beneath the Rafah border.
These were about a meter wide and used winch engines to transport goods in hollowed-out gasoline drums across the sandy tunnel floor.
A Rafah tunnel operator, Abu Qusay, said building a half-mile tunnel took three to six months and could generate a profit of up to $100,000 a day. The most profitable item was bullets, which were purchased in Egypt for $1 each and fetched more than $6 in Gaza. He said Kalashnikov rifles cost $800 in Egypt and were sold for twice as much.
In 2007, the military wing is said to have brought its commander Mohammed Deif through a tunnel from Egypt to Gaza. Deif was the mastermind behind Hamas’ deadly attack on Israel on October 7, which killed 1,400 people and took hostages.
TUNNEL HUNT
Professor Joel Roskin, a geomorphologist and geologist at Israel’s Bar-Ilan University, said it was difficult to accurately map the tunnel network from the surface or space. Adding highly classified information is essential for 3D mapping and image visualization.
Among the elite units tasked with the hiding are Yahalom, special commandos of the Israeli Combat Engineering Corps known as “Weasels,” who specialize in locating, clearing and destroying the tunnels.
Earlier this week, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visited Yahalom fighters and told them: “I trust in you, the people of Israel rely on you.”
Israeli sources said what awaits them is formidable and that they are dealing with an enemy that has regrouped and learned from previous Israeli operations in 2014 and 2021.
“There will be a lot of booby traps. They have thermobaric weapons, which they didn’t have in 2021, which are more lethal. And I think they have acquired a lot of anti-tank weapon systems that will try to strike.” “Our APCs (armored personnel carriers) and tanks,” said Amnon Sofrin, a former brigadier general and former commander of the Combat Intelligence Corps.
Sofrin, who was also previously head of the intelligence directorate of Israel’s Mossad intelligence agency, said Hamas would also try to kidnap soldiers.
Daphne Richemond-Barak, a professor at Israel’s Reichman University and author of the book Underground Warfare, said the conflicts in Syria and Iraq had changed the situation.
“What the IDF (Israeli military) is likely expecting in the tunnels is also all the experience and knowledge that groups like ISIS (Islamic State) have accumulated and … passed on to Hamas.”
Reporting by Jonathan Saul in Jerusalem and Stephen Farrell in London, additional reporting by Phil Stewart in Washington, Nafisa Eltahir and Ahmed Mohamed Hassan in Cairo; Editing by Janet Lawrence
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