Israel opens UN agency tunnels under Gaza Strip

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GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip — The Israeli military says it has found tunnels under the headquarters of the UN agency for Palestinian refugees in Gaza City, suspected to be used by Hamas fighters as an electrical supply room.

The discovery of the tunnels marked the latest chapter in Israel's campaign against the group, which it accuses of collaborating with Hamas.

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Recent Israeli claims that up to a dozen operatives were involved in the October 7 Hamas attack on Israel have plunged the agency into a financial crisis, forcing major donor nations to freeze funding as well as twin investigations. The agency says it has also frozen Israel's bank accounts, embargoed aid shipments and canceled tax breaks.

On Thursday, the army invited journalists to see the tunnel.

It did not definitively prove that Hamas operated in the tunnels under the UNWRA facility, but it did indicate that at least part of the tunnel ran under the facility's courtyard. The military said the headquarters provided electricity to the tunnels.

UNRWA Commissioner-General Philip Lazzarini said the agency had no knowledge of the underground facility, but said the details merited an “independent investigation,” which the agency could not do because of the ongoing war.

The headquarters on the western edge of Gaza City is now in ruins. To locate the tunnel, the forces replicated Israeli tactics used elsewhere in the strip, overturning piles of red dirt, creating a crater-like opening and opening a small tunnel entrance. An Associated Press reporter was led to an underground passage that stretches for at least half a kilometer and has at least 10 doors.

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At one point, journalists looked up from the tunnel, through the opening, and made eye contact with soldiers standing in the courtyard of the UNWRA facility.

In one of the UNWRA buildings, journalists saw a room full of computers with cables running down to the ground. The soldiers then showed them a room in the underground tunnel where they said the wires had been connected.

This underground room had a wall of electrical cabinets with colored buttons and dozens of cables laid out. The military said the room served as a hub that powered the tunnel infrastructure in the area.

“Twenty meters above us is the headquarters of UNRWA,” said Lt. Col. Ido, who has changed his last name from the military. “This is an electrical room, you can see everything around. The batteries, the electricity in the walls, everything comes from here, all the energy for the tunnels you walk through comes from here.”

An Associated Press reporter was able to see the tunnel beyond the area beneath the facility.

Hamas has admitted to building hundreds of kilometers of tunnels through Gaza. One of the main targets of the Israeli attack was to destroy a network that Hamas said was used to transport fighters, weapons and supplies throughout the territory. It accuses Hamas of using civilians as human shields and exposes the many tunnels that run near mosques, schools and UN facilities.

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Lazzarini said the agency doesn't know what's underneath, saying he's visited the facility several times and doesn't recognize the electrical room. Lazzarini wrote in a statement that UNWRA conducted a routine quarterly inspection of the facility in September.

“UNRWA is a human development and humanitarian organization that does not have military and security expertise or the ability to conduct military inspections of what may or may not be under its premises,” the statement said.

The tunnel also contained a small bathroom with a journalist toilet and faucet, a room with shelves, and what the military said was a tunnel line where Hamas fighters had penetrated. According to the military, the tunnel started at the UNWRA school, is 700 meters long and 18 meters deep.

According to the military, forces found rifles, ammunition, grenades and explosives at the facility, which they said were used by Hamas terrorists. Tuma said agency staff had not visited the headquarters since the Oct. 12 evacuation and did not know how the facility was being used.

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During its four-month campaign in Gaza, Israel found such primitive quarters in the tunnels that run through Gaza. The offensive began after Hamas attacked Israel on October 7, killing about 1,200 people and taking 250 hostages to Gaza. Since then, Israeli warplanes and ground troops have killed more than 27,000 Palestinians in the area. The death toll could not be independently confirmed, and Hamas does not distinguish between the deaths of fighters and civilians.

Unable to identify one window that exited the object and was completely preserved. Bullet holes covered the walls. Shrapnel was everywhere, crumpled UN vehicles perched precariously on top of building debris. The dogs roamed the area.

“The Israeli army has captured our largest UNRWA headquarters,” Tuma said in response to Israel's accusations. “That's outrageous.”

With additional reporting by Julia Frankel, Associated Press

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