Wednesday, January 13, 2016

PM-PRESIDENT TURN OUT TO WELCOME ISRAELS NEWEST SUBMARINE.

JEWISH KING JESUS IS COMING AT THE RAPTURE FOR US IN THE CLOUDS-DON'T MISS IT FOR THE WORLD.THE BIBLE TAKEN LITERALLY- WHEN THE PLAIN SENSE MAKES GOOD SENSE-SEEK NO OTHER SENSE-LEST YOU END UP IN NONSENSE.GET SAVED NOW- CALL ON JESUS TODAY.THE ONLY SAVIOR OF THE WHOLE EARTH - NO OTHER. 1 COR 15:23-JESUS THE FIRST FRUITS-CHRISTIANS RAPTURED TO JESUS-FIRST FRUITS OF THE SPIRIT-23 But every man in his own order: Christ the firstfruits; afterward they that are Christ’s at his coming.ROMANS 8:23 And not only they, but ourselves also, which have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body.(THE PRE-TRIB RAPTURE)

Clinton Email Outlined Plan to Spark Arab-Spring Style Protests Against Israel-By Lea Speyer January 12, 2016 , 11:44 am-BREAKINGISRAELNEWS   

“A froward man soweth strife; and a whisperer separateth familiar friends.” (Proverbs 16:28)-In a new batch of released emails from former secretary of state Hillary Clinton, a former US diplomat suggested to Clinton that she push the Palestinians to form Arab Spring-like protests against Israel to push the government to make fresh overtures towards a two-state solution.Thomas Pickering, a former US ambassador to Israel, wrote to Clinton on December 18, 2011 that she should recommend sparking Palestinian demonstrations, led by female protesters, to force Israel to re-enter peace negotiations.The protests, which also called on Israeli Jews to hold parallel demonstrations against the government, should be led by and attended by women only so as to reduce the chances of violence.“On the Palestinian side the male culture is to use force. Palestinian men will not for long patiently demonstrate — they will be inclined over time and much too soon to be frustrated and use force. Their male culture comes close to requiring it,” Pickering wrote.“If the Palestinians see men engaged they will jump in and the soldiers of the IDF will sooner or later use force. This comes from several former senior Israeli military officers I have spoken with. The soldiers are fearful, nervous, outnumbered, insecure and brought up on a severe distrust of Palestinian males whom almost all of them have never spoken to except at roadblocks.”-Want to know what the experts have to say?-While not explaining how the US should trigger the protests, Pickering made clear that the US could never been traced as the catalyst to the events. He recommended that the US hire non-governmental organizations and outside third parties to “help.”Pickering added that Palestinian leaders were already on board with the idea and the mobilization of females could “counteract” fears of violence and turmoil while protecting Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas.“They must develop growth and momentum, just like Tahrir Square, and attract more women to participate and thus gain world attention,” Pickering wrote. “Their leadership has shied away from this idea because they can’t control it; they too are afraid of being replaced by a Tahrir Square style action.”Regarding Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Pickering explained that only “a game changer in the region” would force the Israeli leader to agreeing to a two-state solution.“Netanyahu is not going to move for anything that the Palestinians can offer him which they can deliver. He cannot deliver anything the Palestinians can accept without our help. He is much more satisfied with the status quo than with the risks of change,” he wrote.“What will change the situation is a major effort to use non-violent protests and demonstrations to put peace back in the center of people’s aspirations as well as their thoughts and use that to influence the political leadership. This is far from a sure thing, but far, in my humble view, from hopeless.” Clinton, upon receiving the email, then asked an aide to print it out.Pickering’s email was one of some 3,000 recently released pages of communication by Clinton during her tenure at the State Department. 66 of those emails were deemed classified but, according to the State Department, not labeled as classified at the time they were sent.Clinton, who is running for the Democratic presidential nomination, has come under fire after it was discovered that she used a private email server to send official State Department communications. Clinton maintains that she neither sent nor received classified information using her personal email account.

Israel's INS Dolphin submarine. (Photo: Wiki Commons) Israel’s INS Dolphin submarine. (Photo: Wiki Commons)

Israel’s Newest Sub Nuclear-Capable Set to Arrive on Tuesday-By Abra Forman January 12, 2016 , 3:42 pm-BREAKINGISRAELNEWS   

“The children of Israel shall go into the midst of the sea on dry ground.” (Exodus 14:16)-After ten years and some unexpected delays, Israel is set to mark the long-awaited arrival of its newest submarine, the INS Rahav, on Tuesday.The Dolphin-class vessel will be the fifth to join the Israeli Navy, and will be greeted in a ceremony attended by the country’s top civil and military leaders, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, President Reuven Rivlin, IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Gadi Eizenkot, and Israel Navy commander Admiral Ram Rothberg.The INS Rahav will be escorted to its new home in the Haifa naval base by a fleet of Israeli vessels, including the four existing submarines, missile boats, and naval commando ships.Ordered over a decade ago and assembled by a shipbuilding company in Germany, the Rahav measures over 220 feet long and weighs in at over 2,000 tons. While the submarine was officially unveiled in 2013, it required an additional year and half of work to become operational. It began its 3,450-mile journey to Israel with a crew of 50 in mid-December.According to foreign reports, the vessel will have second-strike capabilities, allowing Israel to launch nuclear-armed missiles from the submarine in the event of a nuclear attack.The reports are unconfirmed by Israel, which is famously mum about its nuclear assets, though foreign analysts estimate that the Jewish state could have up to 200 nuclear warheads.The Rahav, which reportedly cost Israel $2 billion, has an advanced air-independent propulsion system which will enable the craft to stay submerged for weeks at a time, significantly enhancing Israel’s ability to perform covert reconnaissance missions.

PM, president turn out to welcome Israel’s newest submarine-$400 million INS Rahav, which arrives in Haifa from Germany, said to expand Israel’s purported nuclear ‘second-launch’ capabilities-January 12, 2016, 4:55 pm-THE TIMES OF ISRAEL

Israel’s leaders were on hand at the Israeli Navy’s Haifa base on Tuesday to welcome the country’s fifth Dolphin-class submarine.Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, President Reuven Rivlin, Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon and Chief of General Staff Lt. Gen. Gadi Eisenkot attended the arrival of the German-built INS Rahav.It left the German port of Kiel last month and sailed in with a crew of 50 on board.Due to be operational in a matter of months, the vessel cost NIS 1.6 billion (around $406 million), one-third of which was underwritten by the German government.Netanyahu said the submarine, which, according to foreign reports is capable of delivering a nuclear payload, would be a key part of the country’s defensive array.“ Above all else, our submarine fleet acts as a deterrent to our enemies who want to destroy us. They won’t achieve their aims,” he said. “They need to know that Israel can attack, with great might, anyone who tries to harm it.”The submarine is “a formidable war machine,” Rivlin said, “the most advanced, complex and most expensive” item in the Israeli military’s arsenal.“In the decades to come, the INS Rahav will take an active part in defending the country and its maritime territory, by acting deeper, further and longer underwater,” he said. “Seeing without being seen, keeping a watchful eye, and projecting our operational abilities on the naval front.”Ordered a decade ago, the Rahav will be Israel’s fifth Dolphin-class submarine, joining the Tanin, Tekuma, Leviathan and Dolphin at the Haifa naval base.Israeli submarines are reportedly capable of carrying nuclear-tipped missiles, affording the tiny Jewish state a “second-strike” capability in case it is attacked by nuclear weapons.Israel has not acknowledged that it possesses nuclear weapons, although foreign media and analysts say it possesses as many as 200 warheads.Rahav is the Hebrew name for the Greek god of the sea, Neptune, and has been used for other naval ships in the past, but it can also mean “haughtiness” or “arrogance” in modern HebrewThe submarine, built by the German Howaldtswerke-Deutsche Werft shipbuilding company, was unveiled in April 2013, but required an additional year and a half of work to make it fully operational. The diesel-powered sub is over 220 feet (67 meters) long and weighs more than 2,000 tons.The vessel’s air-independent propulsion system, which operates through a fuel cell instead of using louder, oxygen-dependent sources, allows it to remain underwater without surfacing for weeks at a time, a naval source said.Last year, the INS Tanin — “Crocodile,” in Hebrew — arrived in Israel. The reportedly nuke-capable submarine, similar in most ways to the new Rahav, came equipped with 10 torpedo tubes capable of holding a variety of missiles, according to Defense News.Submarines, unmatched in their ability to hide from enemy navies, have long been a key element in Israel’s defense policy.Israel also purchased a sixth submarine from Germany in 2013, which is expected to be completed in a few years. It is not yet clear if it will join the current fleet, or replace one of the older vessels.

Arab MK: Cops who killed TA gunman should be prosecuted-Liberman says Hanin Zoabi should herself stand tried for incitement after she claims Nashat Milhem was ‘liquidated’-By Times of Israel staff January 12, 2016, 6:43 pm

Joint (Arab) List MK Hanin Zoabi on Monday called for the prosecution of the Israeli security forces personnel who killed the terrorist Nashat Milhem last weekend, after he opened fire on troops who came to arrest him.“The fatal shooting of Nashat Milhem was a liquidation, because the security forces could have arrested him,” she told Palestinian media. “The person who shot him dead must be prosecuted.”Milhem was killed in a shootout with police and the Shin Bet on Friday, a week after he killed three Israelis — Alon Bakal, Shimon Ruimi and Ayman Shaaban — during a shooting spree in Tel Aviv, and then fled a massive police for his hometown in the northern Israeli town of Arara. According to officials, Milhem, who was located after an extensive manhunt, was not affiliated with any organized terror group, but is believed to have been motivated by a jihadist ideology. He opened fire on security forces when they came to arrest him in his home village of Arara, police said; they had been given orders to take him alive if possible, but were unable to do so.Responding to Zoabi’s remarks, Yisrael Beytenu party leader Avigdor Liberman urged the state to cancel a plea bargain recently signed with her under which she avoided incitement charges. On Thursday, she was instead indicted for “insulting a public official” during an incident last year in which she branded Israeli Arab policemen as traitors.“I turned to the attorney general to demand he cancel the plea bargain signed between MK Hanin Zoabi and the state,” Liberman said. “I demand that, in lieu of that, Zoabi be indicted for threats and incitement to racist violence.”Liberman said he would appeal to the High Court of Justice if the attorney general declined his request.Zoabi later responded to Liberman, accusing the foreign minister of “inciting” against the Arab community in Israel.“Mr. Liberman himself incites and threatens serious violence against the Arab population again and again,” she said. “He is in no place to preach and determine the appropriate conduct.”The controversial Arab lawmaker last week apologized for calling Arab policemen traitors during a demonstration in Nazareth in 2014. The apology is part of the plea bargain, which allowed Zoabi to dodge the more serious incitement charge for the July 2014 incident, during which she accused an Arab police officer of treason against his people, a statement interpreted by officials as a call for violence against Arab Israeli officers.Zoabi has been the subject of previous investigations for incitement and has seen numerous failed attempts by fellow lawmakers to remove her from parliament.A vociferous critic of the Israeli government and society, she came under fire for taking part in the May 2010 flotilla to Gaza that ended in a deadly clash between pro-Palestinian activists and IDF troops. In 2014, the MK refused to use the label “terrorists” for those who abducted and killed three Israeli teenagers in the West Bank.

LAND FOR PEACE (THE FUTURE 7 YEARS OF HELL ON EARTH)

JOEL 3:2
2 I will also gather all nations, and will bring them down into the valley of Jehoshaphat, and will plead with them there for my people(ISRAEL) and for my heritage Israel, whom they have scattered among the nations, and parted my land.(UPROOTED ISRAELIS AND DIVIDED JERUSALEM)(THIS BRINGS ON WW3 BECAUSE JERUSALEM IS DIVIDED,WARNING TO ARABS-MUSLIMS AND THE WORLD).

THE WEEK OF DANIEL 9:27 WE KNOW ITS 7 YRS

Heres the scripture 1 week = 7 yrs Genesis 29:27-29
27 Fulfil her week, and we will give thee this also for the service which thou shalt serve with me yet seven other years.
28 And Jacob did so, and fulfilled her week:(7 YEARS) and he gave him Rachel his daughter to wife also.
29 And Laban gave to Rachel his daughter Bilhah his handmaid to be her maid.

DANIEL 11:21-23
21 And in his estate shall stand up a vile person, to whom they shall not give the honour of the kingdom: but he shall come in peaceably, and obtain the kingdom by flatteries.
23 And after the league made with him he shall work deceitfully: for he shall come up, and shall become strong with a small people.
24 He shall enter peaceably even upon the fattest places of the province; and he shall do that which his fathers have not done, nor his fathers' fathers; he shall scatter among them the prey, and spoil, and riches: yea, and he shall forecast his devices against the strong holds, even for a time.

DANIEL 9:26-27
26 And after threescore and two weeks(62X7=434 YEARS+7X7=49 YEARS=TOTAL OF 69 WEEKS OR 483 YRS) shall Messiah be cut off, but not for himself: and the people of the prince that shall come shall destroy the city and the sanctuary;(ROMAN LEADERS DESTROYED THE 2ND TEMPLE) and the end thereof shall be with a flood, and unto the end of the war desolations are determined.(THERE HAS TO BE 70 WEEKS OR 490 YRS TO FUFILL THE VISION AND PROPHECY OF DAN 9:24).(THE NEXT VERSE IS THAT 7 YR WEEK OR (70TH FINAL WEEK).
27 And he ( THE ROMAN,EU PRESIDENT) shall confirm the covenant (PEACE TREATY) with many for one week:(1X7=7 YEARS) and in the midst of the week he shall cause the sacrifice and the oblation to cease,(3 1/2 yrs in TEMPLE ANIMAL SACRIFICES STOPPED) and for the overspreading of abominations he shall make it desolate, even until the consummation, and that determined shall be poured upon the desolate.

JEREMIAH 6:14
14 They have healed also the hurt of the daughter of my people slightly, saying, Peace, peace; when there is no peace.

JEREMIAH 8:11
11 For they have healed the hurt of the daughter of my people slightly, saying, Peace, peace; when there is no peace.

1 THESSALONIANS 5:3
3 For when they shall say, Peace and safety; then sudden destruction cometh upon them, as travail upon a woman with child; and they shall not escape.

ISAIAH 33:8
8  The highways lie waste, the wayfaring man ceaseth: he hath broken the covenant,(7 YR TREATY) he hath despised the cities, he regardeth no man.(THE WORLD LEADER-WAR MONGER CALLS HIMSELF GOD)

JERUSALEM DIVIDED

GENESIS 25:20-26
20  And Isaac was forty years old (A BIBLE GENERATION NUMBER=1967 + 40=2007+) when he took Rebekah to wife, the daughter of Bethuel the Syrian of Padanaram, the sister to Laban the Syrian.
21  And Isaac intreated the LORD for his wife, because she was barren: and the LORD was intreated of him, and Rebekah his wife conceived.
22  And the children (2 NATIONS IN HER-ISRAEL-ARABS) struggled together within her; and she said, If it be so, why am I thus? And she went to enquire of the LORD.
23  And the LORD said unto her, Two nations are in thy womb, and two manner of people shall be separated from thy bowels;(ISRAEL AND THE ARABS) and the one people shall be stronger than the other people;(ISRAEL STRONGER THAN ARABS) and the elder shall serve the younger.(LITERALLY ISRAEL THE YOUNGER RULES (ISSAC)(JACOB-LATER NAME CHANGED TO ISRAEL) OVER THE OLDER ARABS (ISHMAEL)(ESAU)
24  And when her days to be delivered were fulfilled, behold, there were twins in her womb.
25  And the first came out red, all over like an hairy garment; and they called his name Esau.(THE OLDER AN ARAB)
26  And after that came his brother out, and his hand took hold on Esau's heel; and his name was called Jacob:(THE YOUNGER-ISRAELI) and Isaac was threescore (60) years old when she bare them.(1967 + 60=2027)(COULD BE THE LAST GENERATION WHEN JERUSALEM IS DIVIDED AMOUNG THE 2 TWINS)(THE 2 TWINS WANT JERUSALEM-THE DIVISION OF JERUSALEM TODAY)(AND WHOS IN CONTROL OF JERUSALEM TODAY-THE YOUNGER ISSAC-JACOB-ISRAEL)(AND WHO WANTS JERUSALEM DIVIDED-THE OLDER,ESAU-ISHMAEL (THE ARABS)

ISAIAH 28:14-19 (THIS IS THE 7 YR TREATY COVENANT OF DANIEL 9:27)
14 Wherefore hear the word of the LORD, ye scornful men, that rule this people which is in Jerusalem.
15 Because ye have said, We have made a covenant with death, and with hell are we at agreement; when the overflowing scourge shall pass through, it shall not come unto us: for we have made lies our refuge, and under falsehood have we hid ourselves:
16 Therefore thus saith the Lord GOD, Behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation a stone, a tried stone, a precious corner stone, a sure foundation: he that believeth shall not make haste.
17 Judgment also will I lay to the line, and righteousness to the plummet: and the hail shall sweep away the refuge of lies, and the waters shall overflow the hiding place.
18 And your covenant with death shall be disannulled, and your agreement with hell shall not stand; when the overflowing scourge shall pass through, then ye shall be trodden down by it.
19 From the time that it goeth forth it shall take you: for morning by morning shall it pass over, by day and by night: and it shall be a vexation only to understand the report.

Peres: We have to close our eyes a bit, and make peace-The former president, 92, insists Abbas remains a partner-By Yardena Schwartz January 12, 2016, 2:55 pm-THE TIMES OF ISRAEL

TEL AVIV (JTA) — Last month, rumors flooded the Internet that former Israeli president Shimon Peres was dead. True to form, the man who tirelessly trumpets his country’s high-tech sector took to Facebook to clear the air.“I wish to thank the citizens of Israel for the support, concern and interest, and wish to clarify that the rumors are false,” wrote Peres, a Nobel Prize winner. “I’m continuing with my daily schedule as usual to do whatever I can to assist the State of Israel and its citizens.”Having fought for Israel before the state even existed, leading its military through its formative years and founding two of the nation’s first kibbutzim, Peres, now 92, is the last man standing from the generation that built Israel. Appointed director general of the Defense Ministry in 1953 at the age of 29, Peres’s political career has spanned seven decades, ending just over a year ago with the conclusion of his seven-year stint as president.Yet when Peres announced he was still alive, he meant very much alive — and very much still in action. On a typical day, he is up at 4:30 a.m. to read and “do sport” (he walks on the treadmill). By 8:30 he is at his office, and he often works until 11 p.m.Speaking to JTA from the Peres Center for Peace, the nonprofit he founded in 1996 to promote coexistence, Peres discussed why he’s busier than ever — and why he still hasn’t given up on peace.JTA: It’s been over a year since you left politics. How do you fill your days now? Shimon Peres: The Peres Center for Peace is working for peace and innovation all over the world. The center is already 20 years old and it has a brilliant record. One of our programs is called Saving Children. I found out that there were 2,000 Palestinian children wounded during the intifada. We decided to bring all of them to Jerusalem and all of them were cured. Once that was done, other parents of Palestinian children came to us and said, ‘My child wasn’t wounded in the war, but he has a problem with his heart or his brain. Please help us.’ So our record now is 11,000 children cured in hospitals in Jerusalem on our account.Two months ago marked 20 years since the murder of Yitzhak Rabin. If you could speak to him now, what do you think he would say about the state of Israel today? We would continue to do what we did. We started making peace. We started with Jordan, made peace with Jordan. We made peace with the Egyptians, and we started with the Palestinians. It wasn’t completed, but we must continue to do the same thing. I think that our security, well-being and our Jewish character demands peace. If we will not achieve peace, we will always be engaged in war and terror. And I think it’s possible. I think we can achieve peace.In spite of the terror attacks, we shouldn’t lower our efforts to make peace. You cannot answer a knife with a knife. I don’t think we can live if we continue just trying to destroy each other. Many Arabs understand this, too, and we see it now. For many years the Arab attitude was reflected in the Khartoum Resolution, naming three laws: not to recognize Israel, not to negotiate with Israel and not to make peace with Israel. That’s over. Now there are Arab peace projects. There’s a Saudi project, there’s an Arab League project. They’re talking about peace and that’s a major change. Maybe their plans are not exactly what we are seeking, but it’s a big difference from being an organized refusal to making peace with Israel, to an attempt to see how to bridge the divide.Does Israel have a partner for peace? We do have a partner. But we have to decide — do we want a partner for peace or a partner for war? I’m speaking about Abu Mazen [Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas]. He talks about peace, he talks against terror. He doesn’t talk the Zionist language, but I don’t expect him to. He has in his police force 15,000 people and they in fact are fighting against terror.Do you think Israel hasn’t done enough to take advantage of this partner for peace? I’m not going to look at who to blame. I’m not interested in this. I’m more interested in seeing who to moralize for peace. I know peace is hard to achieve. I speak from experience. People come to me and say, ‘You’re right, we need to make peace. You’re right, we need to pay a price.’ But, they say, ‘Why are you paying so much? Why are you so naive to trust them so much?’ There are two things in life that if you really want to achieve, you have to close your eyes a bit, and that is peace and love. With eyes wide open, I’m not sure anybody would fall in love, and I’m not sure anybody would make peace. But when you compare what is better, living in peace and living in love, even if it’s not perfect, is by far the right choice.What do you think the rise in attacks by Arab-Israelis says about Israel today? They have equal rights. There is no apartheid in Israel. But they feel discriminated against because the standard of living for Israelis is higher than the standard of living for Arabs. What we have to do is promote their standard of living. I think we can do it and we should do it, and that’s what we are doing at our center. Israel was once a clear bipartisan issue in the United States, but there is some evidence today that Republicans are more likely to support Israel when its interests diverge from America’s. What could be done to change that? I think we have to stick to the bipartisan support. We shouldn’t take sides in internal American issues. We have to appreciate that the US friendship with Israel is bipartisan, so we cannot show an involvement in American politics, just as Americans are careful not to show involvement in Israeli politics.

Hamas may have nearly as many terror tunnels as before 2014 war — report-Israel often talks of finding technological solution to tunnel threat, but has not allocated the budget to do so, Haaretz says-By Times of Israel staff January 12, 2016, 1:56 pm

Eighteen months after the last Israel-Hamas war, the Islamist terror group is believed to have rebuilt much of its cross-border tunnel infrastructure, with almost as many terror tunnels reaching under the Gaza border into Israel as before the summer 2014 conflict, Haaretz reported on Tuesday.“Hamas is investing considerable effort and immense amounts of money in the tunnel project,” the report said. “The reasonable assessment is that the number of tunnels that extend beneath the border (into Israel) is now close to the number prior to (2014’s) Operation Protective Edge.”The Israel Defense Forces said it destroyed more than 30 Hamas terror tunnels during the 50-day conflict, about one-third of which extended beneath the Gaza border into Israel, and several of which were used to stage attacks.A senior Hamas member, Rahman al-Mubashar, was killed late last month when a tunnel in which he was working, collapsed. Al-Mabashar was one of the Hamas terrorists involved in the 2006 kidnapping of soldier Gilad Shalit, who was grabbed from his IDF base inside Israel by a terror cell that crossed in a tunnel beneath the border. Al-Mubashar died when the tunnel he was in collapsed “east of Khan Younis,” Hamas announced last month. “The only thing in the (Gaza) Strip east of Khan Younis is the border with Israel,” Tuesday’s Haaretz report noted dryly.Israeli security officials do not believe that Hamas is currently seeking another major round of conflict with Israel in and around Gaza. But the Shin Bet and Israeli security forces have recently exposed several advanced Hamas efforts to carry out major acts of terrorism from the West Bank, including the kidnapping and killing of Israelis. In May 2014, the killing and kidnapping of three Israeli teens in the West Bank set in progress a sequence of events that led to that summer’s conflict, and the possibility of a similar sequence of events is not being discounted, the Haaretz report indicated.Israel has said since the 2014 war that it is seeking technological solutions to the tunnel threat. However, Haaretz reported, the cost of a fence around Gaza that would include a technological defense against the terror tunnels is estimated at some NIS 2.8 billion (some $700 million), and there is no such budgetary allocation in the current defense budget, it said.In August 2015, Hamas released a video apparently showing renewed cross-border tunnel infrastructure in the Gaza Strip as well as a range of military equipment and techniques for targeting IDF forces. That same month, the Shin Bet said that a Hamas tunnel digger nabbed in a joint Shin Bet and police operation had provided a wealth of information on the terror group’s tunnel-digging in the Strip and its strategy for a future conflict with Israel.A month earlier, The Times of Israel reported that hundreds of workers were digging tunnels in various parts of Gaza, including under the Israeli border, inside the Strip and on the Egyptian border. Some in the Israeli defense establishment, that report said, “have a working assumption that, a year after Operation Protective Edge, it is likely that Hamas already has one or more tunnels crossing the border fence and reaching inside Israel. Hamas is putting an enormous amount of effort, personnel and money into digging with heavy engineering equipment.” However, it added, Hamas was hamstrung by a shortage of some of the materials “vital to the tunnel industry.”In May 2015, Omer Bar-Lev, a Zionist Union MK and former commander of the IDF’s elite Sayeret Matkal unit who sits on the Knesset’s Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, said Hamas was expanding its network of underground tunnels, including one that may reach into Israeli territory.During the 2014 war, Hamas gunmen emerged from the tunnels on several occasions to ambush IDF forces, killing several soldiers. Two months after the war ended, an IDF spokesman said Hamas had planned to use the tunnels for a massive coordinated attack inside Israel. “They planned to send 200 terrorists armed to the teeth toward civilian populations,” Peter Lerner said in October 2014. “This was going to be a coordinated attack. The concept of operations involved 14 offensive tunnels into Israel. With at least 10 men in each tunnel, they would infiltrate and inflict mass casualties.”