What lies in wait for Israeli ground troops in Gaza, security sources say, is a Hamas tunnel network hundreds of kilometres long and up to 80 metres deep, described by one freed hostage as “a spider’s web” and by one expert as the “Viet Cong times 10”.
The Palestinian Islamist group has different kinds of tunnels running beneath the sandy 360-sq-km coastal strip and its borders - including attack, smuggling, storage and operational burrows, Western and Middle East sources familiar with the matter said.
The United States believes Israel’s special forces will face an unprecedented challenge having to battle Hamas militants while trying to avoid killing hostages held below ground, a U.S. official said.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
JERUSALEM/LONDON, Oct 26 (Reuters) - What lies in wait for Israeli ground troops in Gaza, security sources say, is a Hamas tunnel network hundreds of kilometres long and up to 80 metres deep, described by one freed hostage as “a spider’s web” and by one expert as the “Viet Cong times 10”.
The Palestinian Islamist group has different kinds of tunnels running beneath the sandy 360-sq-km coastal strip and its borders - including attack, smuggling, storage and operational burrows, Western and Middle East sources familiar with the matter said.
Israeli security sources say Israel’s heavy aerial bombardments have caused little damage to the tunnel infrastructure with Hamas naval commandos able to launch a seaborne attack targeting coastal communities near Gaza this week.
A small number of narrower, deep, smuggling tunnels were still operating until recently between Egypt and Gaza, according to two security sources and a trader in the Egyptian city of El Arish, but they had slowed to a near-halt since the Israel-Hamas war started.
Shortly afterwards Hamas’s military wing, the Izz el-Deen al-Qassam Brigades, captured Gilad Shalit and killed two other Israeli soldiers after burrowing 600 metres to raid the Kerem Shalom base on the Gaza border.
And I believe they acquired a lot of anti-tank weapon systems that are going to try to hit our APCs (armoured personnel carriers), tanks," said Amnon Sofrin, a former brigadier general and former commander of the Combat Intelligence Corps.
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