By Ali Karbalaei
The revelation by WSJ indicates lack of progress in Gaza by the invading army
TEHRAN- The Israeli military has failed to destroy Hamas tunnels in the Gaza Strip, with up to 80 percent still intact, according to a report by The Wall Street Journal.
Citing American and Israeli officials, the WSJ reported it was difficult to estimate exactly how much of the underground tunnel system has been damaged or rendered unusable because it is unknown how far it truly stretches, but officials estimate the damage ranges between 20 to 40 percent.
Most of the tunnels that have been damaged or rendered unusable are located in the northern part of the besieged Gaza Strip, the report added.
After nearly four months of the indiscriminate Israeli war on Gaza and amid the relentless daily bombardment of the enclave, the Israeli mission to destroy the Hamas tunnels has been a colossal failure.
It would explain one of the reasons why the Palestinian resistance is still inflicting heavy losses against Israeli troops and military vehicles on a daily basis.
Earlier this month, the New York Times cited Israeli officials as saying the tunnels in Gaza are far larger and more sophisticated than what the regime's officials had estimated in December 2023.
The regime's military has tried a number of measures to penetrate the underground tunnel system in the enclave.
It has pounded the territory with airstrikes, used explosive devices on the ground, deployed dogs with cameras to search for the tunnels ahead of the entry of troops, and even pumped seawater from the Mediterranean in an attempt to flood the tunnels but to no avail.
Infamously, the regime's military claimed Hamas leaders as well as command centers were located underneath hospitals in northern Gaza.
Israeli ground forces, backed by tanks, raided the hospitals, destroyed medical equipment and caused more agony for thousands of patients only to find nothing underground but leaving the medical centers unfunctional.
The ICU unit in al-Shifa hospital, one of the largest medical complexes in the Gaza Strip, which the Israeli military stormed in northern Gaza, is still out of service.
Seven out of 24 hospitals remain open in northern Gaza. But these are only partially functioning, without enough specialist medical staff to manage the volume and range of injuries, nor sufficient medicines and medical supplies, fuel, clean water, or food for patients or staff, according to the World Health Organization.
As the Israeli military focuses on the southern part of the enclave, a similar scenario is unfolding.
The regime's military operations in Gaza’s second largest city, Khan Younis, have ramped up over the past week.
The Israeli army has claimed???, once again, that Hamas leaders and the resistance movement's command and control centers are based under the hospitals in the southern Gazan city.
Heavy fighting continued on Monday in the vicinity of Khan Younis’ hospitals for the eighth consecutive day.
The Palestinian resistance says it is defending the city's civilian population from Israeli massacres and is inflicting heavy losses on Israeli troops and military vehicles.
The Israeli military has alleged that its intelligence suggests members of Hamas are operating inside and around the Nasser and al-Amal hospitals in the city.
It is the same Israeli intelligence that said Hamas was operating from hospitals in the north.
The Palestinian Red Crescent Society and the Palestinian health ministry have warned that hospitals in Khan Younis have been "under siege" over the past week in a repeat of the regime's alarming strategy in northern Gaza earlier in the war, which Tel Aviv said was designed to uncover tunnel entrances.
Displaced civilians seeking shelter near the Palestine Red Crescent's Al Mawasi Hospital in Khan Younis have been ordered to evacuate by the Israeli military, the organization said, forcing thousands of people to leave the compound.
"There is a state of panic and tension which prevails among the displaced citizens," Muhammad Abu Musabeh, Director of the Ambulance and Emergency Centre, told the Palestine Red Crescent Society.
International aid organizations and Gazans have both said that the regime's ground offensives are intended to push the 2.3 million population toward Egypt in an effort to ethnically cleanse them from Gaza.
On Monday, the armed Palestinian groups published a number of video clips highlighting their resistance against the invading Israeli army.
The Palestinian resistance is engaged in fierce clashes with the Israeli occupation forces in the center and west of Khan Younis.
The armed wing of Hamas, the al-Qassam Brigades, announced that it had targeted two Israeli Merkava tanks with Al-Yassin 105 shells in an area west of the city.
Elsewhere, the al-Qassam Brigades published clips that show the shelling of Israeli ground forces on the front line as they attempt to advance to the central region of the Gaza Strip.
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