On Monday, the IDF demolished a tunnel, constructed by Islamic Jihad, that stretched from inside Gaza to an Israeli kibbutz. The IDF reportedly used new monitoring technology to detect and locate the subterranean passageway. Yoni Ben Menachem writes:

The tunnel-digging is a large-scale project that employs thousands of people and costs tens of millions of dollars. Hamas and Islamic Jihad receive financial and technological assistance from Iran for the project. A large portion of the financial resources also comes from tax revenues that are supposed to alleviate Gaza’s electricity, water, and employment shortages but are diverted to tunnel-building.

On October 24, 2017, Yahya Sinwar, the leader of Hamas in Gaza who is also the commander of the organization’s military wing, boasted that [his forces] can now fire in 51 minutes the same number of rockets they fired at Israel during the 51 days of Operation Protective Edge [in 2014]. . . . Hamas and Islamic Jihad see the tunnels into Israeli territory as a “strategic weapon” that deters Israel.

They have adopted a tunnel-digging method taken from the Viet Cong playbook. The aim is to infiltrate Israel by surprise with large forces that will capture territories, attack communities and IDF bases near the Gaza border, and kidnap civilians and soldiers for bargaining purposes. . . . The . . . subterranean offensive [would] take place when Hamas and Islamic Jihad launch a ground and rocket offensive, surprising Israel and establishing a major military advantage in the initial stages of the fighting. . . .

Beyond the eight Palestinian operatives who were killed in the strike on the tunnel, including the commander of Islamic Jihad’s central-Gaza brigade and his deputy, the operation dealt a harsh operational and psychological blow to Islamic Jihad and Hamas. The organizations had portrayed the tunnels as a special weapon for which Israel had no solution.

Last week, the New York Times reported, based on unnamed sources within the Trump administration, that the president had asked Israel not to carry out a planned strike on Iranian nuclear facilities. That is, somebody deliberately gave this information to the press, which later tried to confirm it by speaking with other officials. Amit Segal writes that, “according to figures in Israel’s security establishment,” this is “the most serious leak in Israel’s history.” He explains:

As Israel is reportedly planning what may well be one of its most consequential military operations ever, the New York Times lays out for the Iranians what Israel will target, when it will carry out the operation, and how. That’s not just any other leak.

Seth Mandel looks into the leaker’s logic:

The primary purpose of the [Times] article is not as a record of internal deliberations but as an instrument of policy itself. Namely, to obstruct future U.S. and Israeli foreign policy by divulging enough details of Israel’s plans in order to protect Iran’s nuclear sites. The idea is to force Israeli planners back to the drawing board, thus delaying a possible future strike on Iran until Iranian air defenses have been rebuilt.

The leak is the point. It’s a tactical play, more or less, to help Iran torpedo American action.

The leaker, Mandel explains—and the Times itself implies—is likely aligned with the faction in the administration that wants to see the U.S. retreat from the world stage and from its alliance with Israel, a faction that includes Vice-President J.D. Vance, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, and the president’s own chief of staff Susie Wiles.

Yet it’s also possible, if less likely, that the plans were leaked in support of administration policy rather than out of factional infighting. Eliezer Marom argues that the leak was “part of the negotiations and serves to clarify to the Iranians that there is a real attack plan that Trump stopped at the last moment to conduct negotiations.”