‘Hamas has suffered hundreds of casualties underground,’ touts Defense Minister Gallant.
By World Israel News Staff
Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant touted the IDF’s progress inside the Gaza Strip, in particular highlighting Hamas losses in the southern Strip, in and around its last stronghold, Khan Yunis.
Speaking with soldiers from the Combat Engineering Corps’ Yahalom unit on Thursday, Gallant claimed that Hamas morale has collapsed, leading dozens of terrorists to abandon the group’s tunnel network.
“Hamas is collapsing within its own tunnels that it painstakingly dug,” Gallant told the soldiers. “Every place it thought would be a trap for IDF soldiers becomes an area where we hit [Hamas].”
“Hamas has suffered hundreds of casualties underground as a result of your and your friends’ operations.”
“And besides, we’ve only been in the last day and a half, yet we have over 100 terrorists who have come up, some of them underground, in the Khan Yunis area, and in other places – because they understand that they can’t fight against the IDF. It’s thanks to you and your friends.”
“We will not be able to strike everyone in Hamas, but we will reach a point where we dismantle this organization; it will not control Gaza, and it will not have military force.”
Gallant’s comments come as the IDF’s Paratroopers Brigade moves deeper into Khan Yunis, home of Hamas chief and mastermind of the October 7th attacks, Yahya Sinwar.
And IDF spokesperson said that soldiers operating in Khan Yunis raided multiple Hamas positions in the city Thursday, seizing weapons caches and gunning down terrorists.
Israel estimates that close to 10,000 of the 25,700 Gazans who have died thus far in the war were terrorists aligned with Hamas.
As IDF forces gain ground in Khan Yunis, growing numbers of Palestinian Arab civilians are moving further south to Rafah, on the Egyptian border.