IDF strikes Hamas internal security sites, says they are part of group’s war effort

Emanuel (Mannie) Fabian is The Times of Israel's military correspondent

This handout photo distributed by the Israel Defense Forces on December 13, 2023, shows troops operating in the Gaza Strip amid the war against Hamas. (Israel Defense Forces)
This handout photo distributed by the Israel Defense Forces on December 13, 2023, shows troops operating in the Gaza Strip amid the war against Hamas. (Israel Defense Forces)

The IDF says it has completed a series of airstrikes against sites used by Hamas’s internal security on the Gaza-Egypt border.

In a statement, it says the strikes, carried out by fighter jets, attack helicopters and drones, targeted military compounds, guard posts, observation posts, weapons depots and command centers belonging to Hamas’s internal security forces.

“The sites that were hit in the Rafah area, where Hamas terrorists operated, aided the smuggling efforts led by the Hamas terror organization and included weapons that endanger IDF soldiers operating in the Gaza Strip and the citizens of Israel,” the IDF says.

It says the strikes “deal a blow” to Hamas’s ability to smuggle more weapons into the Strip.

It says Hamas’s internal security apparatus “robs humanitarian resources entering the Gaza Strip, aids in the smuggling of additional weapons, and its operatives are complicit in Hamas’s activities against IDF forces in the Gaza Strip.”

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