The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and the Israel Security Agency (Shin Bet) executed a targeted operation in southern Gaza, striking a Hamas command and control center constructed in a subterranean tunnel beneath the European Hospital in Khan Yunis. The strike, announced in a joint statement, is the latest evidence in a persistent pattern of Gaza’s Iranian-backed terror militias embedding military operations within protected civilian infrastructure, using hospitals as shields and endangering civilian life amid ongoing conflict.
The joint military and intelligence raid was planned following significant surveillance and intelligence-gathering, with officials emphasizing that the operation’s goal was to eliminate active Hamas combatants while avoiding harm to Gaza residents and hospital staff. According to official sources, the IDF utilized precision-guided munitions, aerial surveillance, and real-time intelligence, halting the operation at any hint of new risk to civilians. These stringent measures, military spokespeople stress, stand in stark contrast to the operational tactics of Hamas terrorists, who have repeatedly used medical institutions, schools, and places of worship as armories, bases, and hiding places, making Gaza’s civilians involuntary shields for their military enterprise.
The broader conflict began with the October 7, 2023, attack, when thousands of Hamas terrorists breached Israel’s southern border, murdering and abducting over a thousand Israeli civilians in a calculated massacre. Since then, the IDF has conducted extensive operations to dismantle Hamas’s networks, weaken the group’s ability to threaten Israel, and rescue dozens of hostages held inside Gaza’s tunnels—including some held in or near hospitals.
Thursday’s operation revealed that Hamas continues to use protected sites in flagrant violation of international law, removing the neutrality hospitals are supposed to offer. The Geneva Conventions prohibit the use of hospitals for acts harmful to the enemy; however, once a hospital is used to plan or conduct attacks, it forfeits protection from targeting so long as precautions are taken. The IDF and Shin Bet, in their statement, reaffirmed the importance of compliance with these international norms and underscored the efforts made to minimize noncombatant harm.
The tactic of embedding terrorist activity in hospitals is neither new nor unique to this instance. Over the past decade, Israel has documented repeated cases of tunnel entrances in hospital courtyards and Hamas leadership using medical sites for military operations. In previous phases of the current war, and in earlier conflicts such as in 2014 and 2021, Israeli forces found weapons caches, rocket launch sites, and vital Hamas communications equipment within or beneath medical facilities across Gaza. Israeli officials argue that this systemic exploitation is part of a deliberate strategy: provoking civilian tragedy to trigger international condemnation of Israel and constrain its military options.
The raid on the Hamas command cell beneath the Khan Yunis hospital comes as the urban battle for control in southern Gaza intensifies. The IDF’s approach combines ground operations, precise airstrikes, and extensive warnings to residents to evacuate combat zones, including public messages and direct calls to medical staff. These contrasts sharply with tactics employed by Hamas, which has blocked civilian evacuation and forcibly held hostages—including children and elderly Israelis—in combat zones and tunnels beneath hospitals, as confirmed by testimonies from released hostages and fleeing Gaza residents.
The international response has been polarized. While global organizations have expressed concern over fighting near medical sites and the resulting humanitarian impact, Israel has continued to provide evidence—including aerial footage and forensic investigations—demonstrating how Hamas turns medical and civilian areas into command posts. UN officials and Red Cross teams have partially corroborated these findings during limited site visits escorted by the IDF, though access remains severely constrained by ongoing hostilities and structural dangers posed by Hamas’s booby-trapped tunnels.
Israel’s campaign in Gaza is inseparable from the wider conflict with Iranian-backed terrorist entities. Hamas, recognized as a terror group by the United States, EU, and much of the West, receives weapons, funds, and strategic guidance from Tehran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. The overlap in tactics—using schools, homes, and hospitals as shields—has appeared in Lebanon, Syria, and Yemen, forming a pattern across Iran’s regional proxy network. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Israel Katz have insisted Israel’s actions are necessary acts of self-defense in a war forced on it by Iran and its proxies, primarily to ensure the safety of Israeli civilians and end the ongoing hostage crisis.
Humanitarian agencies have faced hurdles providing aid in the midst of warfare. Israeli officials say that, despite significant efforts—including the creation of humanitarian corridors, coordinated medical evacuations, and facilitating deliveries of supplies—Hamas repeatedly undermines relief efforts by confiscating aid and using critical infrastructure for military activity. Israel maintains that the ultimate solution to Gaza’s civilian suffering is the dismantlement of Hamas’s military infrastructure and the restoration of security to Israeli cities.
In the statement following the strike, the IDF and Shin Bet insisted that operations against Hamas will persist with “full force” and in compliance with legal and ethical obligations. Their aim remains the defense of Israeli citizens against ongoing terrorist threats and the rescue of hostages still held by Hamas. As the conflict continues, Israel’s leadership has called on the global community to condemn the abuse of protected civilian sites for terror and to demand that Hamas cease such war crimes in accordance with international law.
