Report: Half of Hamas Terrorists Killed; 7,000 Remain in Rafah

Half of all the Hamas terrorists in Gaza have been killed during the war, according to Reuters, citing U.S. officials Thursday, and most of the remaining ones are holed up in the town of Rafah, where Israel has been advancing slowly.

Reuters reported:

Hamas has seen about half its forces wiped out in eight months of war and is relying on hit-and-run insurgent tactics to frustrate Israel’s attempts to take control of Gaza, U.S. and Israeli officials told Reuters.

The enclave’s ruling group has been reduced to between 9,000 and 12,000 fighters, according to three senior U.S. officials familiar with battlefield developments, down from American estimates, opens new tab of 20,000-25,000 before the conflict. By contrast, Israel says it has lost almost 300 troops in the Gaza campaign.

Israel estimates that it has killed roughly 15,000 Hamas terrorists, which falls within the range of U.S. estimates.

Reports emerged Friday that Israel had completed its takeover of the entire border between Gaza and Egypt. It has discovered many miles of underground tunnels underneath and along the border, which Hamas previously used to smuggle weapons and goods into Gaza. Controlling that smuggling route means that it will be difficult for Hamas to rearm, and that Israel will expect to make significant but slow gains as it takes over more and more of Rafah.

The U.S. opposed an Israeli operation in Rafah, claiming that Palestinian civilians could not evacuate. But roughly one million Palestinians have left, and the Israel Defense Forces have moved slowly, letting the Biden administration claim credit for an ostensibly more careful campaign. The White House still maintains that Israel is not engaged in a “major” offensive in Rafah, even though Israel’s goals of taking over the city and destroying Hamas have not changed.

The coming weeks could see careful combat, as Israel faces booby-trapped buildings and tunnels in narrow streets, and Hamas uses hit-and-run tactics familiar to other terrorist insurgencies, from Afghanistan to Iraq.

Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of the recent e-book, “The Zionist Conspiracy (and how to join it),” now available on Audible. He is also the author of the e-book, Neither Free nor Fair: The 2020 U.S. Presidential Election. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.