Why has Israel’s ground invasion of Gaza been delayed?

The threat of Israel’s ground invasion of Gaza has been looming large. Over one million in the northern part of the enclave have fled their homes amid non-stop airstrikes. On Sunday, the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) set a three-hour deadline for the residents to roughly evacuate the northern half of the territory.

Armoured vehicles have rolled up on the outskirts of Gaza for the ground assault in retaliation to the October 7 attacks in which 1,400 died in Israel and more than a hundred others were held captive. Troops and other equipment have been amassed. So why has Israel not launched its ground operation yet? Why the delay? We explain.
The timing of Israel’s expected ground campaign in Gaza remains unclear. Its leaders have been indicating for days that an invasion is coming. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday held talks with Israel’s expanded emergency Cabinet, which includes former Opposition lawmakers. “Hamas thought we would be demolished. It is we who will demolish Hamas,” he said.

On Saturday, the IDF said it was preparing to expand its aerial attack with “an integrated and coordinated attack from the air, sea and land”. According to a report in The New York Times (NYT), the invasion was initially planned for the weekend.

But there has been no action so far.

Why is there a delay?

There has been a possible delay because of inclement weather – it has been reportedly raining.

There has been large-scale devastation in Gaza because of the relentless airstrikes. The weather conditions would only make it more difficult for Israeli pilots and drone operators to provide soldiers on the ground with air cover, three senior military officers told The NYT.

Israeli soldiers are silhouetted on a tank near Israel’s border with the Gaza Strip, in southern Israel. The poor weather has delayed its expected ground attack on the enclave. Reuters
An IDF spokesperson was quoted by CNN as saying that they will commence “significant military operations” in Gaza once all civilians have evacuated.

“It’s really important that people in Gaza know we’ve been very, very generous with the time. We have given ample warning, more than 25 hours,” said Lt Col Jonathan Conricus, a spokesman for the IDF.

“I cannot stress more than enough to say now is the time for Gazans to leave. Take your belongings, go south. Preserve your life, and do not fall into the trap that Hamas is setting up for you,” he added.

While a full-scale invasion has been put on hold, the Israel infantry reportedly made their first raids into the Gaza Strip on Friday.

Israeli military spokesperson Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari said troops backed by tanks had mounted raids to attack Palestinian rocket crews and seek information on the location of hostages, according to a Reuters report. This is the first official account of ground troops in Gaza since the crisis began.

Why the ground invasion is challenging

Israel’s ultimate goal is to wipe out the top Hamas leadership that controls the Gaza Strip. However, fighting in the narrow and densely populated land comes with challenges galore.

Palestinian militants have reportedly kidnapped 160 people from Israel and held them in Gaza. These include men, women, children and the old. Now there is growing fear that when Israeli forces invade the enclave the captors will use the hostages as human shields.

Israeli officials have warned that Hamas could kill Israeli hostages and use ordinary Palestinians as human shields, reports The NYT.

That’s not all. Hamas uses a complex network of tunnels and bunkers beneath Gaza City and the surrounding parts of northern Gaza. There is a likelihood that Hamas will attempt to thwart the progress of Israeli forces by blowing up the tunnels and setting up booby traps across the territory, the report says.

“Think of the Gaza Strip as one layer for civilians and then another layer for Hamas,” Conricus was quoted as saying by Bloomberg. “We are trying to get to that second layer that Hamas has built.”

Israel has in the past attempted to target this labyrinth but it met with little success. No one but Hamas knows the full extent of his network of tunnels.

In 2014, the Jewish nation invested in a high-tech tunnel detection system but the sensors are reportedly not foolproof. They cannot detect tunnels that turn and get confused by intersections, according to research by the Tel Aviv-based Institute for National Studies, reports Bloomberg.

In 2021, Israel said it had destroyed 100 kilometres of tunnels underneath Gaza. But Hamas insisted it had a network of 500 kilometres, of which only five per cent was hit, according to the article.

These tunnels only make Israel’s plan to eliminate Hamas far more complicated.

“Gaza is particularly challenging and you’ve had an adversary who has probably spent the last decade and a half since Hamas took over the Gaza Strip preparing for such a moment,” Michael Eisenstadt, director of the Military and Security Studies Program at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy told TIME.

How is Israel preparing for the invasion?

The three senior Israeli military officers told The NYT that Israeli soldiers have been ordered to capture Gaza City and destroy the current Hamas leadership. It would be the first attempt to capture land and hold on to it briefly since hold since its invasion of Gaza in 2008, they said.

Hamas will try to ambush Israeli forces and to make the operation easier, the Israeli military has relaxed some rules of engagement. Soldiers are allowed to make fewer checks before shooting at suspected enemies, the officers said but did not divulge details.

The Israeli troops have also been given additional training which will help them fight in ruined urban environments, a fourth officer Col Golan Vach told The NYT.

How long will the conflict last?

It is too early to determine how long the conflict will last. However, experts believe that extensive military operations will last for weeks, even months.

Some military and political leaders want Israeli soldiers to undertake 18 months of door-to-door arrest operations, Nimrod Novik, a former senior Israeli diplomat and security adviser to the Israeli government, told The NYT. “Others, I think, are far more sober and not talking about demolishing Hamas — but rather depriving Hamas of their ability to threaten us,” he added.

With inputs from agencies