JERUSALEM (JTA) — Hamas planned to use the tunnels it dug from Gaza to Israel to execute a massive attack on southern Israel, an Israeli newspaper reported, citing unnamed Israeli security sources.
Under the plan detailed Friday by the Hebrew-language Maariv daily, Hamas planned to send terrorists through the more than 30 tunnels uncovered by Israeli troops and into six southern Israeli communities on Rosh Hashanah in September of this year.
The plan was to kill and kidnap as many Israelis as possible, according to the report.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reportedly told the security Cabinet about the discovered plot during late last week.
Maariv quoted the security sources as saying the “unplanned war with Hamas prevented a disaster on the order of the Yom Kippur War.”
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