- The IDF says a new video shows Hamas using mosques to cover tunnels
- It says it’s taken out 500 of the more than 800 exposed shafts
- The IDF has killed more than 15,000 people, according to UN-backed figures
The IDF has released a video that it claims shows Hamas using mosques to hide underground tunnels in Gaza.
The IDF video shows a deep tunnel in a building that Israeli soldiers claim is a mosque, and cuts to several more examples of tunnels that it says Hamas is using in the bloodiest conflict in the Middle East in decades.
It also shows IDF soldiers blowing up the tunnels, and was shared with the caption: ‘IDF troops eliminated 500 of the 800+ exposed shafts to Hamas’ underground tunnels located near or inside kindergartens, schools, playgrounds and mosques.
‘To be clear, these places aren’t childproof, but rather teeming with terrorism.
‘Every tunnel shaft and weapon we find is further proof of how Hamas deliberately uses the residents of Gaza for their terrorist agenda against Israelis.’
Israel is currently pushing its offensive from the north to the south of the Gaza Strip, bombing more areas in and around the enclave’s second city, Khan Younis, shortly after warning civilians.
The IDF insists that Hamas’ leadership is hiding in the south of the country, which before the war was home to around a quarter of Gaza’s population, but Palestinians in Gaza said they were running out of places to go.
The Gaza Strip, bordering Israel and Egypt, is currently sealed, and many of the territory’s 2.3 million people are crammed in the south after Israel ordered civilians to leave the north in the early days of the war, sparked by Hamas’ deadly incursion on October 7 that killed 1,200 people,
Heavy bombardment was reported overnight into Sunday around Khan Younis and the southern city of Rafah, as well as parts of the north that had been the focus of Israel’s shattering air and ground offensive.
Juliette Toma, director of communications at the U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees, said nearly 958,000 displaced people were in 99 United Nations facilities in the southern Gaza Strip.
Israel is currently pushing its offensive from the north to the south of the Gaza Strip, bombing more areas in and around the enclave’s second city, Khan Younis
The IDF insists that Hamas’ leadership is hiding in the south of the country, which before the war was home to around a quarter of Gaza’s population
The IDF’s video also shows its soldiers blowing up the tunnels
The Gaza Strip, bordering Israel and Egypt, is currently sealed, and many of the territory’s 2.3 million people are crammed in the south after Israel ordered civilians to leave the north in the early days of the war
Heavy bombardment was reported overnight into Sunday around Khan Younis and the southern city of Rafah
It was not clear how many people had been killed since the end of the cease-fire
Hopes for another temporary truce were fading. A weeklong cease-fire that expired Friday had facilitated the release of just under half of the roughly 240 Gaza-held Israeli and foreign hostages in exchange for Palestinians imprisoned by Israel. But Israel has called its negotiators home.
‘We will continue the war until we achieve all its goals, and it’s impossible to achieve those goals without the ground operation,’ Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Saturday evening. One goal is to remove Hamas from power in Gaza.
It was not clear how many people had been killed since the end of the cease-fire.
On Sunday, Israel’s military widened evacuation orders in and around Khan Younis, telling residents of at least five more areas and neighborhoods to leave.
Source: Daily Mail UK