Babbage: The challenge of tunnel warfare

This week, Israeli soldiers entered the al-Shifa hospital in Gaza, claiming that Hamas runs a command centre in tunnels underneath the building. Hamas has denied this claim. Under the ground in Gaza, though, Hamas does run a sophisticated network of secret tunnels. Israel has vowed to destroy them and their forces will call on every technological trick they can have in their arsenal. But finding and eliminating tunnels is no easy task, and will no doubt make the war more deadly to civilians. How does war work, when it moves underground?

Host: Alok Jha, The Economist’s science and technology editor, with Shashank Joshi, The Economist’s defence editor. Contributors: Daphné Richemond-Barak, author of “Underground Warfare” and a researcher at Reichman University, Israel; Eyal Weizman, an architect at Goldsmiths, University of London and boss of Forensic Architecture, which investigates violence committed by states, police forces, militaries, and corporations.

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