2023-10-31 16:24:58
Time.news – La biggest challenge that awaits them Israeli troopswhich are advancing ever deeper into the Gaza Strip, is the complicated urban development of the enclave but above all the labyrinthine network of underground tunnels built by Islamists, comparable to a gigantic underground military base. Clearing and collapsing those tunnels will be crucial if Israel seeks to dismantle Hamas, as it has promised to do. And today the tunnels offer an undoubted advantage in the asymmetric war that Hamas wages against Israel, capable of destroying the technological superiority of the adversaries.
No one knows for sure how long these tunnels are, the so-called ‘Gaza metro’. Yihyah Sinwar, the head of Hamas in Gaza, said in 2021 that there were 500 kilometers of tunnels in the enclave. If true, Hamas underground tunnels would be a little less than half the length of the New York subway. Tunnels have always been an attractive instrument of war: from the Roman siege to the ancient Greek city of Ambracia, passing through the Middle Ages, up to the battle waged for 80 days by the Ukrainians against the Russian troops, in the 24 kilometers of tunnels built under the Azovstal steel plant in Mariupol.
© SAID KHATIB / AFP
But what makes Hamas tunnels different from al Qaeda’s tunnels in the mountains of Afghanistan or the Viet Cong of Southeast Asia is that they were built under one of the most densely populated areas on the planet, where nearly 2 million people live crammed into 360 square km. “It is always difficult to deal with tunnels, in any context, even when they are in a mountainous area, but when they are in an urban area, then everything is more complicated: (the tactical, strategic aspects are at play , operational and, of course, the protection that we want to guarantee to the civilian population”, explained Daphne Richemond-Barak, who teaches at Reichman University in Israel and is an expert in underground warfare.
The tunnels are dug deep underground, wired with electricity and reinforced with concrete (Israel has long accused Hamas of diverting concrete intended for civilian and humanitarian purposes towards the construction of the underground tunnel network). Among other things, according to American intelligence sources, in the last two years, the tunnels were used by the small cell of militiamen who planned the surprise attack against Israel on October 7: without cell phones or computers, thanks to the telephone lines wired, the militiamen were able to communicate with each other in secret and evade detection by Israeli or US intelligence.
“Most military doctrine advises soldiers against entering underground tunnels because this exposes them to a very high risk,” continues Richemond-Barak, who has been studying this type of infrastructure for years. The intricate corridors, larger rooms, warehouses on different floors and where the humidity is high make it easy to become disoriented and lose track of time. Once underground, it is difficult to communicate with the surface, since “normally the GPS does not work underground” and if a soldier is injured it becomes very difficult to rescue him.
In order not to enter this deadly trap, the Israelis may test new type of weapon, ‘sponge bombs’. The new bomb consists of a large plastic container with two chambers, in each of which there is a chemical substance. Once the container is brought into one of the tunnels, by hand or thanks to a remote-controlled vehicle, it is detonated with remote ignition: the two chemicals mix and form a foam (hence the name of the bomb); and in a very short time, the foam becomes a hard solid like concrete and seals the surrounding spaces, trapping anyone inside.
According to a study by Professor Joel Roskin of Israel’s Bar-Ilan University, tunnels under the Gaza Strip began to be built in 1982 after the peace agreements between Israel and Egypt, when the city of Rafah was divided into an Egyptian part and another in Gaza. It was the residents of Rafah who began creating these conduits to bring contraband goods from Egypt to Gaza and to reunite families who had been separated by the separation.
At the time, local miners were tasked with digging tunnels to help residents of both sectors of Rafah. Over the decades these tunnels began to grow in number and length and weapons and ammunition were added to the essential goods smuggled. The tunnels expanded to other parts of the Strip, and Hamas militants who entered Israeli territory during the October 7 attack did so through those corridors. It is always difficult to destroy these tunnels, but if they are in an urban environment with civilians, as in Gaza City, “the task becomes almost impossible.”
And this is one of the dilemmas Israel faces: “We can expect Israel to conduct bombing attacks to destroy and not simply neutralize underground facilities, using methods such as ‘bunker busters,’ precision-guided strikes, thermobaric weapons, and perhaps even high-pressure water. The question is how to measure the force used, given the possibility that all or some of the 240 hostages held by Hamas and other Palestinian militias, kidnapped on October 7, are in the tunnels.”
Reproduction is expressly reserved © Time.news 2023
#tunnels #sponge #bombs #hostage #dilemma