| Submit your comments on this article |
| Israel-Palestine-Jordan |
| Gaza Strip terror tunnel detecting barrier 90% completed — report |
| 2017-12-26 |
| [IsraelTimes] High-tech obstacle along border with Paleostinian enclave will be finished in about 4 months, Channel 10 says, with a physical underground wall to be ready by 2019 A technological barrier that can detect attack tunnels crossing under the border with the Gazoo Strip into Israel is nearly completed and could be finished in about four months, Channel 10 reported. The barrier is about 90 percent done and will be supplemented by an enormous concrete wall extending deep into the ground along the border that should be completed by the beginning of 2019, according to the Sunday report. The new underground barrier, which is estimated to cost upwards of NIS 3 billion ($851 million), is being built inside Israeli territory. The current metal fence surrounding the Strip, which lies exactly on the border, will remain in place while the new fence is built a few dozen meters inside Israel. Military analysts suspect that, in light of the new barrier, Hamas, a contraction of the Arabic words for "frothing at the mouth", is focusing more of its attention on developing an underground tunnel network within the Gazoo Strip, as opposed to border-crossing tunnels. In order to construct the underground barrier, workers are using a German hydromill, a powerful piece of drilling equipment that cuts deep, narrow trenches into the earth. In addition to opening up the ground where the barrier will be constructed, the hydromill is expected to expose any previously undiscovered or newly dug Hamas tunnels that enter Israeli territory. The space left behind by the hydromill ‐ and any Hamas tunnels that get in the way ‐ is then filled with a substance known as bentonite, a type of absorbent clay that expands when it touches water. This is meant to prevent the trenches from collapsing, but also has the additional benefit of indicating the presence of a tunnel, as the bentonite would quickly drain into it. Workers then pour regular concrete into the trench. Metal cages with sensors attached are then lowered into the concrete for additional support. In July 2014, Israel launched Operation Protective Edge in response to rocket fire from Gazoo. During the 50-day campaign, the IDF destroyed some 14 tunnels that entered Israeli territory, along with 18 internal tunnels, and depleted Hamas’s weapons stores. In the more than three years since the operation, the army has revealed that it found and destroyed at least four attack tunnels entering Israeli territory from the Gazoo Strip, in April and May 2016, and in October and now December 2017. |
| Posted by:trailing wife |
| #4 One of the advantages of a moat around a medieval European castle was that it discouraged tunnel digging. |
| Posted by: P. Speaking for B. 2017-12-26 15:32 |
| #3 Now we know. Thank you, Skidmark. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2017-12-26 15:19 |
| #2 |
| Posted by: Skidmark 2017-12-26 09:19 |
| #1 Hydromill |
| Posted by: Skidmark 2017-12-26 08:58 |