Israeli forces say they have uncovered the biggest Hamas tunnel in the Gaza Strip so far, just 400 metres from a key border crossing.
The IDF’s chief military spokesperson Daniel Hagari said the tunnel spanned over 4km in length and is wide enough for vehicles to pass through.
The entry point to the tunnel lies just a few hundred meters from the heavily fortified Erez crossing and a nearby Israeli military base, the IDF said.
The crossing was among the sites overrun by Hamas militants when they launched a brutal attack on Israel on October 7. That day, militants used a rocket-propelled grenade to break past the portion of wall close to the Erez crossing and stormed the base, killing at least three soldiers and kidnapping some back to Gaza, the army said.
More than 1,200 Israelis died in the October 7 attack, which triggered a devastating war that has claimed more than 18,000 lives in the Hamas-ruled Gaza strip.
Israel’s military and intelligence have faced criticism for failing to detect the attack ahead of time.
Hagari said the tunnel had helped to facilitate the transit of vehicles and militants but would not specify whether it was used in the October 7 attack.
“Millions of dollars were invested in this tunnel,” he said. “It took years to build this tunnel... Vehicles could drive through.”
Hagari showed reporters a video of Mohammed Sinwar, brother of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar and himself a senior operative in the group, sitting in the passenger seat of a vehicle that he said was driving inside the tunnel.
Maj Nir Dinar, a military spokesperson, said that Israeli security services didn't know about the tunnel before October 7 because Israel's border defenses only detected tunnels meant to enter Israel.
“As far as I know, this tunnel doesn’t cross from Gaza into Israel and stops within 400 meters from the border, which means the indicators won’t indicate that a tunnel is being built,” he said.
He added that the entrance, a circular cement opening leading to a cavernous passageway, was located under a garage, hiding it from Israeli drones and satellite images.
In other developments, Foreign Secretary David Cameron called for a “sustainable ceasefire” in Gaza on Sunday and warned that “too many civilians have been killed”.
The comments, in a joint letter with German counterpart Annalena Baerbock, went further than previous UK calls for a humanitarian pause.
It comes after the White House expressed unease about the failure of Benjamin Netanyahu’s administration to reduce civilian casualties and its plans for the future of Gaza.
Writing in the Sunday Times, Lord Cameron said: “Our goal cannot simply be an end to fighting today. It must be peace lasting for days, years, generations. We therefore support a ceasefire, but only if it is sustainable.”
But both Lord Cameron and his German counterpart stopped short of calling for an immediate ceasefire, something that has been a recurring demand by pro-Palestinian campaigners as the death count in Gaza continues to grow.
