Exactly.
I can’t quite grasp whether is it feigned ignorance or naivety when people ask this question.
I’m sure Palestinians know. They managed to evacuate Rafah with unprecedented speed so Hamas could turn the whole area into a booby trap for the IDF.
https://www.jpost.com/israel-hamas-war/article-807932
Soldiers were also being killed when manually defusing booby traps and it was estimated it would take in excess of 2 years to remove them all using sappers in a report by a military expert I read ages ago.
No army would put their soldiers at risk like that so it’s unsurprising they use a method of less risk as it is their duty to protect their soldiers the same as any other army of a democratic country.
The 350 miles of tunnels under Gaza (described as a spiders web) impact the foundations of buildings on top of them as well.
Construction and destruction of the tunnel network in Gaza have contributed to the widespread collapse of buildings and other infrastructure
^^
The extensive nature of the tunnels, many of which are deliberately built under civilian areas, means that combat operations targeting them can cause devastating damage above ground.
Key impacts on buildings include:
- Targeted destruction: The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) have directly targeted buildings concealing tunnel infrastructure or used by Hamas for military operations, causing them to collapse. During the 2021 conflict, an Israeli airstrike targeting a tunnel system in Gaza City brought down three residential buildings, killing dozens of civilians.
- Booby-trapped tunnels: Tunnels connected to above-ground structures can be rigged with explosives. In June 2025, a booby-trapped building in Khan Younis collapsed on Israeli soldiers who were searching for tunnel entrances, killing four.
- Destabilized foundations: Military analysts suggest that repeated airstrikes targeting tunnels with powerful "bunker-buster" bombs can destabilize the ground beneath buildings, compromising their foundations and leading to collapse.
Can you imagine if the IDF had left whole areas of Hamas booby trapped buildings and who would be blamed when civilians returned and the inevitable happened?