Posted on November 23, 2023 by Scott Johnson in Hamas, Israel, Media

Notes from underground

The IDF has carefully overtaken and explored the tunnel system that converges on Gaza City’s Shifa Hospital. The IDF seeks to expose the Hamas way of war as inherently criminal — a point that has gotten lost in the media shuffle.

Shifa Hospital director Muhammad Abu Salmiya was arrested yesterday along with several other hospital staff members while attempting to evacuate southward along the humanitarian corridor — i.e., the escape route. The JNS story quotes the IDF statement:

“The director of the Shifa Hospital in the Gaza Strip was apprehended and transferred for ISA questioning following evidence showing that the Shifa Hospital, under his direct management, served as a Hamas command and control center,” the statement read.

“The Hamas terror tunnel network situated under the hospital also exploited electricity and resources taken from the hospital. In addition, Hamas stored numerous weapons inside the hospital and on the hospital grounds.”

The statement continued: “Furthermore, after the Hamas massacre on October 7th, Hamas terrorists sought refuge within the hospital, some of them taking hostages from Israel with them. A pathological report also confirmed the murder of CPL Noa Marciano on the hospital premises.

“In the hospital, under his management, there was extensive Hamas terrorist activity. Findings of his involvement in terrorist activity will determine whether he will be subject to further ISA questioning.”

The IDF is exposing the tunnel system it has found underneath the hospital. As IDF Lt. Colonel Richard Hecht puts it here: ” We have moved past the blast door and discovered full subterranean complex, complete with a dormitory, kitchen, bathroom, and more. The scale of this tunnel, parts of which Hamas worked to bury is absolutely incredible[.]”

This is by way of introduction to IDF spokesman Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari’s tour of the “hidden Hamas terrorism base beneath Gaza’s largest hospital—stark proof of Hamas’ direct threat to innocent lives.” The Hagari video is below. It is also posted here on YouTube. Don’t miss this one.

The IDF puts the tracking shot to good use in the Hagari video. It reminds me of the scene taking viewers into the Copacabana in Goodfellas. Where’s the kitchen? Like Henry Hill in Goodfellas — Hamas, they’re business is construction.

As one knowledgeable observer has counseled regarding the video tour of the tunnel system– take a good look around, you helped pay for it. The tweet plaintively poses the question whether this is enough proof for you. We know the answer to that question. Query whether Israel will even be allowed to finish the job.

The video below provides an accelerated tour while the tweet poses the question whether “the world [will] condemn Hamas[.]” We know the answer to that question too.

Below is Hagari’s statement on the IDF’s findings. The “important question” Hagari poses to “the international community” now that the IDF has provided “irrefutable proof” of the Hamas way of war is this one: “What will you do to stop Gazans’ hospitals from being turned into terror bases in the future? Will you condemn Hamas, or will you continue to…remain silent?” We know the answer to those questions too.

In the video below the IDF provides a look at “further tunnels under the Qatari building in the Shifa hospital compound….tunnels intersecting with underground rooms with air conditioning, toilets, and a kitchen. Rifles, magazines, and drones can be seen gathered from throughout the site.”

In the most recent video the IDF has more to show.

Here is a cogent summary by Israeli government spokesman Eylon Levy.

Share
Tweet

Notice: All comments are subject to moderation. Our comments are intended to be a forum for civil discourse bearing on the subject under discussion. Commenters who stray beyond the bounds of civility or employ what we deem gratuitous vulgarity in a comment — including, but not limited to, “s***,” “f***,” “a*******,” or one of their many variants — will be banned without further notice in the sole discretion of the site moderator.

Responses