Hamas’s satanic network of tunnels is thought to be hundreds of kilometres long and as deep as 80 metres

Beneath the coastal strip and its borders, the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas maintains an extensive network of tunnels that is thought to be hundreds of kilometres long and as deep as 80 metres. According to the US, Israel’s special forces will encounter an unparalleled difficulty in combating Hamas militants while attempting to prevent the deaths of hostages detained underground.

According to Hamas, tunnels are a means to blunt some of Israel’s military advantages, which include its overwhelming aerial and armoured superiority, by making Israel’s soldiers move underground in confined areas that are familiar to Hamas fighters.

According to Israeli security sources, despite Israel’s intense aerial bombardment, the tunnel infrastructure has not been severely damaged. As a result, Hamas naval commandos were able to launch a seaborne attack this week that targeted coastal communities close to Gaza. Smuggling tunnels between Egypt and Gaza are still in use, though they are shallower and less frequent than the tunnels used by Hamas to escape from Egypt.

Established in Gaza in 1987, Hamas is believed to have started tunnel construction in the middle of the 1990s after Israel gave Yasser Arafat’s Palestine Liberation Organisation some measure of autonomy in Gaza. Hamas is more powerful in Gaza than it is in the Israeli-occupied West Bank due in large part to the tunnel network, which makes it more difficult to enter from Jordan due to Israeli settlements, military installations, and surveillance equipment.

Tunnelling became easier after Israel withdrew its troops and settlers from Gaza in 2005 and Hamas won an election in 2006. Gilad Shalit was captured by Hamas’s military wing, the Izz el-Deen al-Qassam Brigades, after they dug a 600-meter tunnel to attack the Kerem Shalom base on the Gaza border. The Brigades also killed two other Israeli soldiers. A year later, Hamas launched a military operation against Arafat’s forces in Gaza by using tunnel-mounted attacks.