Israel Plans to Flood Hamas Tunnels, WSJ Reports

Israel is considering the possibility of flooding the underground tunnel network of Hamas in the Gaza Strip using pumps filled with seawater, reports The Wall Street Journal, citing American officials.

According to the publication, the Israeli army set up large pumps about one and a half kilometers north of the Al-Shati refugee camp in mid-November to push water into the tunnels. Each of at least five pumps can extract water from the Mediterranean Sea and push thousands of cubic meters of water into Hamas's tunnels every hour.

The entire flooding process could take a week, potentially allowing militants and possibly hostages to flee from the tunnels, the source told the publication. However, it noted that the effectiveness of these plans remains in question, as the precise characteristics of the tunnels and the surrounding soil are unknown.