NYT: "The Tunnels of Gaza. How the subterranean maze below the Gaza Strip works."

Their bombing/fighting above ground along with kinda-sorta okay we bombed some hospitals is an effective terror/revenge campaign but in all seriousness - I don't know how Israel intends to fight Hamas in practice. If they actually go into the tunnels - they will have what the military itself considers to be unacceptable causalities. And Israeli public will start rending their garments and gnashing their teeth at the loss of real lives that is to say Israeli Jew lives.

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Ninja edit

I googled to try to learn what the IDF's plans might actually be. It was very aggravating.

• I watched ~90 of a video and it seemed like it was crappy so that was that.

• I had look at this page - Palestinian tunnel warfare in the Gaza Strip. It seemed pointless but just before I closed the tab I saw It had a single IDF PR sentence. "In October 2023, the Israeli Defense Forces were reported to be considering the use of sponge bombs as a non-lethal means of sealing tunnels during their incursion into the Gaza Strip." Of course - it's a big lie that Israel would even consider "non-lethal means". They want to kill as many people as possible. And they want them to suffer as much as possible.

Sponge bomb

A sponge bomb is a specialized device designed to seal the end of a tunnel. Small enough that it can be set by a single person, it is a non-explosive, chemical bomb that releases a burst of expanding foam that quickly hardens.

I changed my search to something simple and I found this...

Israel Must Destroy Hamas's Tunnels | Foreign Affairs

Only a “hard kill,” meaning the collapse of the walls and roofs of the subterranean structures, will sufficiently degrade Hamas’s capabilities over the long term. Bulldozers can be used to expose tunnels during a ground operation. Drones, robots, or dogs can help clear tunnels.

[...]

A ground operation will not bring about the destruction of Hamas’s underground military apparatus. This is a job that needs to be done mainly from the air, using thermobaric weapons, bunker buster bombs, and precision-guided munitions, and from the surface using liquid emulsion (a combination of two harmless liquids that turn into a powerful explosive when mixed) and other and newer tools developed by the Israeli military. This is how most states have eliminated subterranean threats in the past, and this is what Israel should do, as well.

I read this Economist article: Israel hopes technology will help it fight in Hamas's tunnels. The first 2/3rd reads like American and Israel MIC about the wonders of modern military hitech tools. The last 1/3rd doesn't do much in explaining how the IDF will defeat Hamas. But there's more on the wonders of modern military tech. Finally it says what we already know "Both sides are in for a brutal fight."

Once a tunnel has been discovered, the next step is to disable or destroy it. With relatively shallow tunnels that can be done from the air, using “bunker-buster” bombs that penetrate the ground before detonating. But Hamas’s tactic of digging tunnels beneath civilian infrastructure means that such strikes can kill many civilian bystanders. The IDF, for instance, claims that some of Hamas’s leaders are holed up in a tunnel network beneath the al-Shifa hospital, Gaza’s biggest.

Egypt, which controls Gaza’s southern border, has in the past flooded smuggling tunnels used by Hamas with sewage. Israel has poured concrete into tunnels during earlier conflicts. But hauling in enough is probably impractical in the present war, reckons one American military official.

An Israeli security official says the idf will be making use of “sponge bombs”. These contain chemicals that, when mixed, expand into a dense, hard foam, blocking off the tunnel and buying time for a proper demolition with explosives later on. Sponge bombs are also used in a tactic known as “purple hair”. A smoke grenade is thrown into a tunnel before a sponge bomb seals the entrance. If the trapped smoke wafts out of a nearby building, that suggests it conceals another entrance.

Sometimes, though, soldiers will need to enter the tunnels. Drilling rigs can make new entrances to avoid booby-traps set at existing ones. Elbit Systems, an Israeli firm, has developed an armed quadcopter that uses computer vision to fly in enclosed spaces. Other drones can roll through tunnels and climb stairs.

Both sides are in for a brutal fight. Hamas will be hoping that its tunnels will help it compensate for the IDF’s overwhelming advantage in firepower. The Israelis, meanwhile, will hope their technology can transform those same tunnels from a refuge into a trap.