Chicago Jewish Star · Chicago, IL · 31 March 2017
CP-2017-027
Gaza tunnels 'serious'
IDF HEAD: BUT TUNNELS ARE NO 'STRATEGIC THREAT'
Tazpit News Agency
Transcribed from the clipping
Israel Defense Forces Chief of Staff GADI EISENKOT said March 22 that while Hamas tunnels into Israel from Gaza should be taken seriously, they do not represent an existential or a strategic threat.
Speaking to a Knesset State Control Committee about State Comptroller YOSEF SHAPIRA's recent report about the 2014 Operation Protective Edge, Eisenkot said "the underground threat is very serious, and we treat it as such.
"But I don't think it is an existential or strategic threat." Eisenkot said that during the operation the army discovered more than a dozen tunnels from Gaza into Israeli territory, which allowed Hamas members to infiltrate Israel and led to the deaths of 13 soldiers during the fighting.
The army commander added that the IDF and defense ministry have dedicated more than NIS 4 billion since Protective Edge to defend against the tunnel threat. NIS 1.2 billion have gone for training programs to develop effective responses to the threat, including an advanced radar system and an intelligence gathering apparatus.
How this transcription was made
Date and publication rest on the collector's slide label; no masthead, folio or printed dateline appears on this clipping.
Context added by this archive
Whole item transcribed. The paper's house style sets personal names in small capitals on first mention (GADI EISENKOT, YOSEF SHAPIRA); reproduced here in capitals. Photograph of Eisenkot with a vertical credit reading "— GADI EISENKOT / IGPO PHOTO VIA ASHERNET".
The item counts 13 Israeli soldiers dead and NIS 4 billion spent and gives no Palestinian casualty figure for Protective Edge.
Cite this clipping
"Gaza tunnels 'serious'," Chicago Jewish Star, 31 March 2017. Covering Palestine archive, CP-2017-027. https://coveringpalestine.org/archive/cp-2017-027
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Last updated 2 November 2026
This record is part of Covering Palestine, an archive of American newspaper clippings about Palestinians, 1724 to 2023. Researched and assembled by Maria Robles.
The clipping belongs to the newspaper that printed it, or to the news agency that supplied the copy. It is reproduced here for research, criticism and commentary. A city here is where the newspaper was published, not where the story came from, and on most records it was taken from the masthead.
Something wrong here, or something you know about this clipping? The archive is still being built and corrections are wanted: maria@rozumstudio.com, quoting CP-2017-027.
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