The military consequences aside: that Israel has this much precise intelligence has to be rattling Hamas:
The air force struck more than 100 targets yesterday, the second day of Israel’s aerial bombardment of Gaza. According to Palestinian sources, the bombings killed 43 people, bringing the death toll for the two-day operation to 294. Among the targets were 40 smuggling tunnels under the Gaza-Egypt border, which Israel bombed in an effort to shut down Hamas’ main conduit for arms. That operation took exactly four minutes. Most of the targets, however, were in Gaza City, including Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh’s office and the offices of various Palestinian security services. The air force also hit several targets in northern Gaza, the main launching pad for Palestinian rocket strikes on Israel.
The Israelis have probably concluded, though, that they can’t dismantle Hamas from the air. About 300 Hamas operatives have been killed but that still leaves roughly 14,700 well-armed and well-trained soldiers hiding underground and among civilians. Hamas is presumably holding them back for the impending Israeli ground operation. That’s not stopping them from showing some of their cards though:
Two Katyusha rockets that Hamas fired deep into Israel on Sunday are the same type launched by Hizbullah during the Second Lebanon War… The two rockets were Hamas’s deepest attacks into Israeli territory to date… Police sappers who analyzed the projectiles said they carried six to seven kilograms of explosives each, and identified them as 122-millimeter PIPE type-81 Katyusha rockets, which have a range of 40 km. The rockets contained metal balls designed to act as shrapnel, and the intended effects were visible at a home situated just a few meters from where one of the rockets hit, which looked as if it had been sprayed with a machine gun. Large, gaping holes peppered the front of the house.
Weird how Hamas got their hands on those: when the State Department pressured Sharon to abandon the Philadelphi corridor between Gaza and Egypt they promised that safeguards would be put in place to prevent weapons smuggling. And yet three years later Israel had to go and destroy dozens and dozens of tunnels being used for weapons smuggling. It’s almost like there was some kind of unblinking anti-Israel bait and switch at work.
There are still hundreds of tunnels throughout the Gaza Strip because the IAF hasn’t gotten the green light to go after them. Too many open up in apartment buildings and schools – getting those will almost certainly require a ground operation. There have already been two waves of reserve call-ups – 6,700 total soldiers at the cost of about a quarter of a million dollars per day. These are likely only the beginning of what may become tens of thousands of activated reservists: the cost alone means that you don’t call them up until you’re ready to use them.
References and previously after the jump…
References:
* IDF ground forces gather on Gaza border; cabinet approves call-up of 6,700 reservists [Ha'aretz]
* Hizbullah-type rockets fired [JPost]
* Arab Unity and American Diplomacy [MR]
* IDF: Tunnel bombing cripples Hamas [YNet]
* Cost of calling up 6,700 reservists for Gaza op is NIS 3 million a day [Ha'aretz]
Previously:
* Hamas Heavily Armed, Skeptical About Israeli Commitment To Self-Defense
* Obligatory Post About Global Outrage, Newly Discovered Appreciation For Israel Security Concerns
* Hamas Now Doing Everything Humanly Possible To Generate Gaza Civilian Casualties
