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Tunnels Undermine Israeli Offensive

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Los Angeles Times

Published: January 12, 2009

RAFAH, Egypt - Some of them are said to be big enough to accommodate railroad cars. They may reach a depth of 50 feet, and are reported to be equipped with cables and electric motors that move food, fuel and probably some of the heaviest rockets that Hamas aims at Israel.

These tunnels also are one of the main reasons fighting is continuing in the Gaza Strip.

As Israel officials debate how far to press their campaign in Gaza, one of their chief goals is to find a way to crimp or halt the flow of arms to Hamas through a complex of tunnels under the territory's border with Egypt.

While ground forces battle Hamas in the streets, Israeli warplanes pummel targets in Gaza near Rafah, the coastal town that straddles the Gaza-Egypt border. Israel's demand to block arms shipments through the "Philadelphi corridor," the strip of land separating Gaza and Egypt, is a central point in cease-fire talks.

HOW THE TUNNELS WORK

•Some of the tunnels are large enough to run railroad cars under the border.

•Wealthy families in Rafah allow their private homes or rental properties to be used as tunnel openings, which are then rented out to Hamas gunrunners.

"When a tunnel is completed, the primary investor and his/her relatives are entitled to a percentage on every shipment passing through it," according to the 2008 report compiled by the Congressional Research Service.

•The U.S. report said arms and ammunition are pulled by cables and electric motors through the tunnels.

IMPORTANCE TO RESIDENTS

•The tunnels are the main conduit for normal commerce and a lifeline for food and medicine since Hamas largely sealed the borders when it took over Gaza in 2007.

•Smuggling through the tunnels is also a primary source of income for Bedouin tribes long neglected by the central government.

IMPORTANCE TO ISRAEL

•Israeli military officials and politicians see the blocking of the tunnels as a prerequisite to any cease-fire.

•"We must reach, at the end of the war, a situation in which this arms smuggling is stopped," Yossi Peled, a general in the Israeli reserves and former head of the Israeli Defense Force's northern command, said last week on Israeli radio.

THE IMPORTANCE OF EGYPT

•U.S. and Israeli experts say any effort to shut down the tunnels is likely to focus on a diplomatic agreement with Egypt, which has shouldered the responsibility for policing the border crossing since Israel's withdrawal from Gaza.

•Egyptian officials say current agreements with Israel permit only 750 Egyptian border guards to monitor the crossing. Calls to increase the number were rebuffed.

•The growth of the tunnel network, however, has prompted critics, including some in the U.S. Congress, to doubt whether Egypt has done enough.

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