The IDF revealed how the Hamas terrorist organization uses Al-Shifa Hospital in Gaza City as a command and control center, in a video played as part of an English briefing on Friday night.
IDF Spokesman Daniel Hagari shared a video that showcased an intricate network of passageways and chambers deep beneath the hospital and other civilian buildings – where innocent Gazan civilians receive medical care and other services – such as mosques, UNRWA centers, and more. Hamas uses these buildings as shields for its own military efforts.
Hamas uses hospitals, mosques as shields for underground terror network
Inside Al-Shifa specifically, Gaza’s largest hospital with 1,500 beds and 4,000 employees, “Hamas also has an entrance to its terror tunnels from inside hospital wards. From different places inside the hospital, you can enter underground tunnels.
“Right now, terrorists move freely in Al-Shifa hospital,” Hagari continued. “Hundreds [of terrorists] fled to the hospital to hide after the massacre on October 7.
Operational Update with IDF Spokesperson https://t.co/3DenBv8hnS
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“Hamas wages war from hospitals,” he stressed, adding that this “not only endangers the lives of Israelis but exploits innocent Gazan civilians as human shields.”
Hagari shared a conversation recorded between two anonymous people, during which Speaker B asks: “Where are the main headquarters of Al-Qasam Brigades?” Speaker A responds: “Under the compound Al-Shifa. Yes, the leadership headquarters are under the Al-Shifa compound. Bathrooms, rooms, headquarters.”
The next day, on Saturday, the IDF and Shin Bet released further documentation of the organization’s use of the hospital, publishing clips from two interrogations of terrorists captured on October 7 after the massacre.
In the video, one of the terrorists openly admits that these tunnels and operation rooms are located under hospitals, including the Al-Shifa Hospital.
“Al-Shifa Hospital is huge, and so we can hide there,” the terrorist says. He adds that when Israel strikes Gaza, Hamas terrorists take cover in schools, hospitals, and other locations that Israel attempts to avoid striking so as to not harm civilians.
The interrogator asks, “So I understand that any place that provides medical care – hospitals, clinics – you exploit?” The terrorist nodded in the affirmative and said that Hamas uses these structures to protect the transport of food, weapons, and other commodities among its members.
A second terrorist delivers a similar message in another video.
The tunnels in the Gaza Strip were initially created to smuggle goods in and out of the area, connecting it to Egypt, Maariv's military correspondent Tal Lev-Ram explained. As time passed, Hamas expanded its tunnel network due to increased Israeli aerial surveillance, which included the use of drones and electronic surveillance equipment in the Strip.
It was only after the 2014 military operation in Gaza that the IDF fully understood the danger and complexity of these tunnels. Consequently, the Israeli government initiated the construction of an underground border barrier along the Gaza Strip to prevent tunnel-based infiltration, he wrote.
Identifying these tunnels is challenging because they can be hidden beneath various structures. However, several methods can be employed to detect them, including ground-penetrating radar and techniques for measuring magnetic, thermal, and acoustic signatures.
Despite these technological methods, human intelligence remains a primary means of discovering these tunnels, as outlined in a 2017 research report from the RAND Corporation, Maariv reported.
Hagari also maintained that Al-Shifa Hospital has fuel, contrary to claims by the United Nations.
In a separate recorded conversation between two anonymous people, a speaker said that Hamas controls the hospital and has fuel and that those “with connections” can bring fuel containers and fill them up.
“Underground, I say they have at least half a million liters” of fuel, Hagari said.
“Hamas is stealing from Gazan civilians to fuel its attacks,” he continued.
At the beginning of the war, the IDF and UNWRA both confirmed that Hamas had stolen fuel from the latter.
“When medical facilities are used for terror purposes, they are liable to lose their protection from attack,” Hagari noted, adding that “this information has been shared with members of the intelligence community. They have been given all of this and more and accepted it.”
The Hamas terrorist organization denied the evidence Hagari presented and claimed it could pave the way for Israel to target the hospital.
“We categorically affirm the falsehood of the Nazi occupation’s story about the use of Al-Shifa Hospital for military purposes, or the presence of any Hamas leadership in it, and we call on the United Nations and the Arab and Islamic countries to intervene immediately to stop the madness of bombing and destroying the medical system,” Hamas wrote on its Telegram page.
Hamas, who is known for engaging in a sophisticated game of psychological warfare, said that the briefing should also be used to confirm “the crime of bombing the Ahli Baptist Hospital.”
While Hamas attempted to accuse Israel of the attack, the hospital parking lot was ultimately proven, and confirmed by multiple international and independent reports, to have been hit by an Islamic Jihad missile fired in Gaza that fell short.