As Israeli troops move on Gaza’s largest urban center in September 2025, Hamas pivots to small-unit raids on outposts and rear areas — a strategy that could exact a heavy price.

GAZA CITY/JERUSALEM

Israel’s military is preparing a fresh ground push into Gaza City after ordering residents to evacuate this week, framing the operation as a decisive move to wipe out Hamas’s last strongholds. For Hamas, the counter is unlikely to be set-piece battles. Instead, the group has leaned back into guerrilla methods that proved costly for Israeli forces over the past year: quick, violent raids on small bases and outposts, ambushes launched from tunnels, and hit-and-run attacks on patrols and logistics hubs.

Those tactics — refined since the early weeks of the war and showcased repeatedly in southern Gaza during the summer — now hang over Israel’s bid to seize Gaza’s largest city. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) say they intend to establish full control, beginning with encirclement and the systematic destruction of buildings they allege are tied to Hamas’s military infrastructure. But every new forward position and staging area the army creates inside the city offers a potential target for small Hamas squads skilled at infiltration and rapid strikes.

The latest escalation came as the IDF airdropped leaflets on September 9 instructing civilians to leave Gaza City ahead of intensified assaults, prompting a panicked exodus by families who have been displaced multiple times since 2023. Israeli jets and artillery have leveled additional high-rises in recent days, and the army has described the fight as a final push. Even before the new orders, Israeli commanders claimed to control swaths of the metropolis and vowed to expand operations street by street.

Hamas, however, has adapted. After suffering significant losses in conventional engagements, the group shifted toward small-unit actions: squads surfacing from tunnels to strike, then melting away; teams using anti-tank guided missiles and large improvised explosives against armor; and ‘inghimasi’ fighters willing to push deep into Israeli perimeters for short, destructive raids. In late August, an assault team broke out of a tunnel zone near Khan Younis to hit an IDF encampment, killing and wounding soldiers before being hunted down by Israeli aircraft. Days later, militants stormed another outpost and destroyed a tank with an explosive charge. None of these attacks altered the map — but each imposed a cost.

Those episodes illustrate why Gaza City, with its dense neighborhoods and vast subterranean network, could prove especially unforgiving. The tunnel grid — nicknamed the “Gaza Metro” — still provides Hamas with the means to move men and materiel, stage surprise attacks, and reappear behind IDF lines. Israeli forces have spent months mapping and blasting shafts, yet commanders concede that clearing hundreds of miles of underground routes while also holding urban ground above is slow, manpower-intensive work. As troops rotate and resupply, they become vulnerable to exactly the kind of base and perimeter raids Hamas has prioritized.

The IDF’s doctrine for Gaza City mirrors earlier phases of the war: heavy air and artillery preparation; raids to isolate neighborhoods; and the sequential demolition of towers alleged to host Hamas functions. The approach reduces some risks to infantry but has limits in an environment where the enemy fights from basements, alleyways and culverts. Israeli units can seize intersections and squares, but keeping them safe requires a patchwork of temporary outposts, command posts, and logistics nodes. These are the places Hamas has learned to hit — often at dawn, using a mix of rockets, small arms and demolition charges before slipping away.

Beyond the battlefield, the political costs of a drawn-out Gaza City operation are mounting. Israel this week faced new criticism after a precise strike in Doha targeting senior Hamas political leaders coincided with renewed talk of a large ground push. European officials floated sanctions and partial trade measures over conduct of the war. Aid agencies warn that another mass displacement from Gaza City — on top of famine conditions already documented in the north — will be catastrophic.

Inside Israel, the government confronts a different pressure: families of hostages still held in Gaza say expanded strikes and an all-out invasion jeopardize their loved ones, especially amid reports that Hamas has moved captives closer to combat zones to deter raids. The IDF insists it can fight while continuing rescue efforts, but each bombed building and blocked street complicates intelligence-gathering and rapid action.

For Hamas, the logic of base raids is straightforward. The group cannot win outright on an open battlefield, and it recognizes Israel’s aversion to protracted urban attrition. Raiding small posts forces Israel to disperse protective units, diverts reconnaissance assets, and erodes morale. It also creates headline-grabbing incidents — a blown-up vehicle, a breached perimeter, a handful of soldiers killed — that magnify the perception of vulnerability. Even failed raids tie down troops and sustain Hamas’s claim of continued resistance.

For Israel, the calculation is harsher with every kilometer advanced. To truly “destroy” Hamas as a fighting force, the army must not only neutralize the group’s battalions and commanders but also dismantle the infrastructure that enables this insurgent style of warfare: the tunnels, the clandestine workshops, the safe houses and communications hubs. That is a task measured not in days but in rotations — and it risks turning Gaza City into an open-ended security burden, a zone that must be garrisoned to prevent the very raids that Hamas is counting on.

There are tactical adaptations available. Israeli units have increased the use of counter-tunnel munitions, ground-penetrating sensors and robot teams; they deploy perimeter cameras and micro-drones around temporary bases; and they pair armor with engineers to harden positions quickly. The IDF has also refined its casualty evacuation and rapid reinforcement drills to blunt the shock effect of a surprise raid. Yet none of this eliminates the fundamental asymmetry: Hamas can choose the time and place of attack, while Israel must defend everywhere, all the time.

Strategically, the stakes stretch beyond Gaza City. Israel is already managing flare-ups with Hezbollah along the northern front and trading long-range strikes with Iran-allied Houthis in Yemen. The broader the regional confrontation grows, the more Hamas benefits from tying down Israeli brigades in an urban grind. A high-cost occupation of Gaza’s capital would increase pressure on Israel’s economy and defense establishment while amplifying its diplomatic isolation.

What would success look like? Israeli leaders speak of “total victory,” but military professionals increasingly describe a more modest end state: degrading Hamas to the point that it cannot conduct coordinated operations above the level of sporadic guerrilla attacks, while creating conditions for alternative governance to emerge. Even that goal requires a plan for what comes after: who secures the streets, distributes aid, repairs power and water, and keeps militants from reconstituting? Without a viable post-conflict blueprint and outside buy-in, the IDF risks clearing neighborhoods only to fight for them again.

For civilians, the choices are bleak. Evacuation orders send families toward already overcrowded southern zones that lack food, water and medical care. Hospitals in Gaza City say they cannot move the sick and wounded safely. Aid groups warn that another wave of flight under fire will deepen a famine the United Nations and independent monitors have been documenting for months.

The coming days will test both sides. If Hamas can sustain a tempo of base and perimeter raids as Israeli units push deeper, it will complicate the IDF’s battle rhythm and raise the human and political costs of every block taken. If Israel can secure its forward posts, disrupt tunnel movement and narrow the group’s room to maneuver, it may shorten the fight — at least for now. Either way, the battle for Gaza City is unlikely to end with a single dramatic capture. It will be decided in the shadows between buildings and below the streets, where a handful of fighters can make a small outpost — and the war effort it supports — feel suddenly very vulnerable.