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Wolfgang's avatar

I’ve often wondered from an engineering standpoint where all of the material inside the tunnels, a rather large volume, was deposited undetected by the IDF.

Learning about the MIT campus construction project from my undergraduate and graduate days leaves me with even more questions.

The Institute purchased 55 acres of uncertain land along the Charles River.

The fill was acquired—from dredging the Charles River and digging the subway. The dirt, sand, and clay are layered beneath the MIT campus, affecting buildings differently.

Manpower, stiff-legged derricks, a railroad, and mixing concrete right on the site are reasons for wondrous efficiency.

However, the campus construction was not required to be accomplished in secrecy in order to avoid aerial and acoustical observation devices.

The Gaza tunnels network was not only constructed but somehow not monitored?

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Shaul Shapira's avatar

It wasn't a secret before Oct 7th that Hamas had tunnels. Here's a link to the the Wikipedia page about them as it existed in April 2023:

https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Palestinian_tunnel_warfare_in_the_Gaza_Strip&oldid=1147951915

"Hamas, the governing authority in the Gaza Strip, has constructed a sophisticated network of military tunnels since it seized control of the Strip in 2007. The tunnel system branches beneath many Gazan towns and cities, such as Khan Yunis, Jabalia and the Shati refugee camp.[1] The internal tunnels, running some dozens of kilometres within the Gaza Strip,[2] have several functions. Hamas uses the tunnels to hide its arsenal of rocketry underground, to facilitate communication, to permit munition stocks to be hidden, and to conceal militants, making detection from the air difficult.

......

Strategic objectives

According to Eado Hecht, an Israeli defence analyst specialising in underground warfare, "Three different kinds of tunnels existed beneath Gaza, smuggling tunnels between Gaza and Egypt; defensive tunnels inside Gaza, used for command centres and weapons storage; and –connected to the defensive tunnels –offensive tunnels used for cross-border attacks on Israel", including the capture of Israeli soldiers.[21][31] Palestinian military personnel in Gaza explained to news Web site al-Monitor that the purpose of a cross-border tunnel was to conduct operations behind enemy lines in the event of an Israeli operation against Gaza.[32] A Palestinian militia document obtained by al-Monitor and also published in The Washington Post described the objectives of the under-border tunnels:

The tunnel war is one of the most important and most dangerous military tactics in the face of the Israeli army because it features a qualitative and strategic dimension, because of its human and moral effects, and because of its serious threat and unprecedented challenge to the Israeli military machine, which is heavily armed and follows security doctrines involving protection measures and preemption. ... [The tactic is] to surprise the enemy and strike it a deadly blow that doesn't allow a chance for survival or escape or allow him a chance to confront and defend itself.[32][33]"

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