The Tunnels of Gaza – The New York Occasions

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The Gaza Strip has all of the harrowing pitfalls troopers have realized to count on from city warfare: high-rise ambushes, truncated strains of sight and, in every single place, susceptible civilians with nowhere to cover.

However as Israeli floor forces inch their manner ahead in Gaza, the larger hazard could show to be underfoot.

The Hamas militants who launched a bloody assault on Israel final month have constructed a maze of hidden tunnels some consider prolong throughout most if not all of Gaza, the territory they management.

And they aren’t mere tunnels.

Snaking beneath dense residential areas, the passageways enable fighters to maneuver round free from the attention of the enemy. There are additionally bunkers for stockpiling weapons, meals and water, and even command facilities and tunnels extensive sufficient for autos, researchers consider.

Extraordinary-looking doorways and hatches function disguised entry factors, letting Hamas fighters dart out on missions after which slip again out of sight.

No outsider has a precise map of the community, and few Israelis have seen it firsthand.

However pictures and video and reviews from individuals who have been within the tunnels recommend the essential outlines of the system and the way it’s used. The supply materials contains images taken contained in the passageways by journalists, accounts from researchers who examine the tunnels, and particulars of the community that emerged from Israeli forces after they invaded Gaza in 2014.

Tactical tunnels

These concrete-reinforced buildings are greater than a transit pipeline. They function shelters towards assaults, planning rooms, ammunition warehouses and areas for hostages.

Illustration by Marco Hernandez

Dismantling the tunnels is a key a part of Israel’s objective of wiping out Hamas’ management within the wake of the Oct. 7 assault.

To do this, Israel’s forces might want to discover entrances which are typically hidden within the basements of civilian buildings, main into concrete-lined tunnels, imagery suggests. They’re sometimes simply six and a half ft tall and three ft extensive, specialists mentioned, forcing fighters to maneuver by them single file.

One 85-year-old Israeli girl who was held hostage for 17 days within the tunnels after being kidnapped on Oct. 7 described being marched by a “spider net” of moist and humid tunnels. She ultimately reached a big corridor the place two dozen different hostages have been being held, she mentioned.

There are nonetheless believed to be greater than 200 Israeli hostages being held by Hamas, and plenty of are possible within the very tunnels Israel goals to destroy. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has mentioned that bringing them residence is without doubt one of the two predominant goals of the invasion, the opposite being to “destroy Hamas.”

The tunnels used for hiding Hamas gear and fighters aren’t the one hidden passageways in Gaza.

After Hamas got here to energy in 2007, and Israel tightened its blockade of the territory, an intensive community of smuggling tunnels grew below the border between Gaza and Egypt. These tunnels are used to avoid the blockade and permit the import of all kinds of products, from weapons and digital gear to development supplies and gasoline.

The Egyptian authorities have made intensive efforts to destroy these smuggling routes, together with pumping seawater to flood the community and collapse lots of the tunnels. However some smuggling tunnels are nonetheless believed to be in operation.

Smuggling tunnels

These tunnels have been documented within the Rafah space, the place they’re used to convey all varieties of items and merchandise into Gaza from Egypt.

Illustration by Marco Hernandez

Though the Israeli navy far surpasses Hamas’ in each dimension and gear, preventing an enemy with its personal community of tunnels is a high-risk endeavor.

John W. Spencer, who research city warfare on the U.S. Navy Academy’s Trendy Struggle Institute, describes it as extra like “preventing below the ocean than it’s on the floor or inside a constructing.”

“Nothing that you just use on the floor works,” he mentioned not too long ago on the Trendy Warfare Challenge podcast. “It’s important to have specialised gear to breathe, to see, to navigate, to speak and to deploy deadly means, particularly capturing.”

One of many predominant risks of going into the tunnels is that Hamas has booby-trapped the entrances with explosives, specialists say.

“The second they understand the Israelis have entered the tunnels, they may simply press the button and your entire factor might collapse on the Israelis,” mentioned Ahron Bregman, a senior educating fellow at King’s School London who specializes within the Arab-Israeli battle.

The problem of disabling tunnels

The hazard doesn’t finish after a tunnel is detected.

Illustration by Marco Hernandez

Israeli forces will most likely not have the ability to destroy your entire tunnel community.

“It’s simply too massive, and there is not any level in dismantling all of it,” mentioned Dr. Bregman. As an alternative, they may concentrate on blocking the entrances to the tunnels, possible by calling in airstrikes, or having engineers destroy them with explosives.

They’re additionally unlikely to take their struggle underground — except they consider they haven’t any different selection.

Getting into the tunnels would strip Israeli forces of their benefits, Dr. Bregman mentioned. For the time being, the Israelis are making headway with a mass of troops, tanks and helicopters.

“The second you get right down to the tunnel, it’s one towards one,” he mentioned.