Israel faces a vicious underground battle against Hamas

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(The author is an assistant professor at the Lauder School of Government, Diplomacy and Strategy at Reichman University)

Over the weekend, Israel woke up to a shocking new reality that few believed was possible: Hamas attacks on its most vulnerable, on top of its already painful conflict with the Palestinians. Medieval-level brutality is also involved.

Now, as airstrikes, warnings of civilians moving south in Gaza and preparations for a ground offensive against Hamas militants get under way, Israel faces a monumental challenge – how to disrupt an entrenched, well-prepared and resourceful group. of enemies. Mainly moving and working underground.

Hamas is an army built for urban warfare, deeply embedded among civilians in Gaza (and to some extent the occupied West Bank). When it fires rockets across the border into Israel, it causes a reaction that will fall on civilian infrastructure such as schools, mosques and residential areas. One of the group’s main command and control centers is believed to be located beneath Gaza’s Shifa hospital, along hundreds of kilometers of underground tunnels that honeycomb the 40-kilometer-long Gaza Strip. Its communication lines are mostly non-electronic. By design, an attack on any of these assets would inevitably cause significant collateral damage and impose significant humanitarian costs.

The challenge of countering Hamas is not unprecedented. The United States faced a similar dilemma when fighting Iraqi militants in Fallujah. Israel itself has engaged in no fewer than five confrontations with Hamas since it withdrew its troops from the Gaza Strip in 2005. But urban warfare in Gaza’s densely populated towns and refugee camps, as well as kilometers of tunnels underground, make for a complex battlefield for Israel.

So how will the new IDF operations be different? Israel’s strategy has changed. In previous rounds of fighting, ceasefires were agreed after days or weeks of airstrikes and limited ground incursions and were widely seen as a victory for Israel and a defeat for Hamas. In each incident, Israel has inflicted major blows, but Hamas has retained most of its military underground facilities, where its leaders and fighters are holed up.

This time, Israel has suffered a more devastating raid than the 1973 Yom Kippur War and is seeking total victory. The IDF will not be content to see Hamas simply surrender or abandon the ceasefire; the goal is to destroy the group as a military threat.

But Hamas has been preparing for months, if not years, for an IDF ground invasion in response to its atrocities. The organization will observe and learn from the experience of terrorist groups in Syria and Iraq, including the Islamic State, as well as the group’s previous combat experience. It knows how to carry out a sustained battle on this terrain. Below the surface, it prevails, possessing the most extensive underground combat capabilities in the world.

The obstacles of fighting in and around the tunnels cannot be overstated. The IDF has limited intelligence on its location, routes and internal activities. Underground, traditional GPS, surveillance and night vision systems do not work. Tunnels increase the risk of raids, kidnappings, booby traps, and one-on-one combat. Few soldiers are equipped to fight in such a claustrophobic, dark and unstable environment. In short, the tunnels are the great equalizer, neutralizing Israel’s superiority in weapons, tactics, technology, and organization. The IDF learned this painfully during Operation Protective Edge in 2014.

Given these realities, Israel needs to conduct long-term, widespread air and ground operations to disrupt these underground infrastructures. Collapse, flood, explosion and sealing of Gaza’s 365 square kilometers of tunnels, bunkers and bases will take months, requiring massive resources and sustained operational advantage. And all this was carried out under attack by Hamas agents taking advantage of their underground strategy. Even in this scenario – which would cause unimaginable casualties – it is unlikely that the entire Gaza tunnel network would be destroyed.

It seems more realistic that Israel will reformulate its goals over time to focus on more achievable goals while maintaining domestic and international support. It could weaken Hamas’s military and political leadership in ways not possible in previous rounds of the conflict and refocus its efforts on defense. Crucially, it must strengthen its capabilities to prevent such a raid from happening again.

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