ISRAELI forces are gearing up to storm Hamas’ tunnel network and rescue hundreds of hostages as hopes fade for a deal with the terror group.
Gershon Baskin, who oversaw the last hostage exchange with Hamas in 2011, has warned that IDF troops could storm the tunnels in hours.
Attempts to secure the release of the 239 Israelis and foreigners held in the underground maze are growing evermore “critical” as the ground operation in Gaza intensifies.
The chance of securing them safely fades daily as IDF troops and tanks continue to blitz the Gaza Strip.
Baskin has even warned that Hamas terrorists may kill the hostages in response to IDF forces hunting them through the tunnels.
The negotiating expert, now 67, helped arrange the return of an Israeli soldier in exchange for over 1,000 Palestinian prisoners in 2011.
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Baskin told The Times: “Within the next few days or even hours, if there isn’t a deal for the release of hostages by agreement, military operations to go into the places hostages might be held will begin.”
“First of all we don’t know what the results of those [military operations] will be, if the hostages will be freed or killed in the crossfire, and Hamas may also respond by killing hostages in response to Israelis going after them in the tunnels.”
Many of the prisoners released in 2011, including Hamas ringleader Yahya Sinwar, went on to carry out the October 7 attacks that killed at least 1,200 Israelis.
After storming the border, Hamas gunmen massacred hundreds of men, women and children in towns and at a music festival – while also taking hundreds hostage.
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Now almost 40 days later the bomb-blitzed Gaza Strip has been “split in two” by IDF forces who have relentlessly pushed ahead with their ground invasion in an attempt to wipe out Hamas.
On Monday they claimed to have discovered one of Hamas’ lairs and weapons headquarters set in a hospital basement in Gaza.
They suspect the terror group to be using hospitals in the strip, in which hundreds of civilians are trapped, as covers for command centres.
The IDF said on Monday that troops were fired at by Hamas fighters from the entrance of Al Quds hospital as they “embedded” themselves among civilians.
Scores of IDF troops and tanks also surrounded Gaza’s biggest medical facility, the Al Shifa hospital, amid fears Hamas’ HQ is hidden in the tunnels underneath.
Like Al Quds, it has stopped accepting new patients after its fuel has completely run out and patients are struggling without enough food, water or medical supplies.
Baskin thinks the hostages are likely being held throughout densely populated areas in the besieged enclave.
Out of the hundreds taken captive, four women have been rescued and one female Israeli solders was rescued.
Hamas have also claimed that at least 50 of them were killed in Israeli airstrikes, which Baskin dubbed “very likely”, although unverified.
He said: “They’re [Hamas] not showing bodies, giving names of hostages, they’re giving no information, so the working assumption of Israel is there are [about] 240 hostages being held by Hamas, all of them are alive and Hamas is responsible for all of them.”
Hamas said on Monday it is ready to release up to 70 women and children in return for a five-day truce with Israel.
Israeli PM Netanyahu has previously insisted that they will not arrange a ceasefire until the hostages are released.
Baskin told the Times that Hamas would have to agree to release up to 150 of them to secure a pause in fighting.
He added: “For Israel to implement a ceasefire, it means they will have to redeploy their forces because if they just stop where they are, they are sitting ducks for Hamas to shoot and kill soldiers, so they can’t just have a ceasefire.”
“It’s not just about calling off the war for a few days, they have to get the soldiers into safer locations.”
After unleashing carnage in Israel, thousands Hamas militants retreated to their vast underground labyrinth which is thought to cover hundreds of miles.
They are believed to have taken with them dozens of abducted captives, including children snatched from their murdered parents.
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Jonathan Conricus, an Israel Defence Forces (IDF) spokesman, previously said: “Think of the Gaza Strip as one layer for civilians and then another layer for Hamas.
“We are trying to get to that second layer that Hamas has built.”
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Ellie Doughty
