Day 803 - Inside the most complex Hamas tunnel network in Gaza
The Times of Israel Daily Briefing
The Times of Israel
4.5 • 1.1K Ratings
🗓️ 17 December 2025
⏱️ 29 minutes
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Summary
Welcome to The Times of Israel's Daily Briefing, your 20-minute audio update on what's happening in Israel, the Middle East and the Jewish world.
Military correspondent Emanuel Fabian joins host Amanda Borschel-Dan for today's episode.
Senior officials from the US, France and Saudi Arabia are set to meet in Paris today amid fears that Israel could embark on a new military operation against Hezbollah in Lebanon after a December 31 deadline to disarm the Iran-backed terror group passes, a diplomatic official told The Times of Israel on Tuesday. We have seen an uptick in tensions over the past few weeks. Fabian takes us back to early October to give context for what is currently happening on the ground.
In one of his first moves, new Military Advocate General Maj. Gen. Itai Ofir decided today to close a criminal case against a senior reserves officer who was facing charges over his involvement in the circumstances that led to the deaths of a soldier and a civilian researcher in southern Lebanon in November 2024. Fabian was in the area when this occurred and fills us in.
Israeli settlers torched a vehicle and sprayed graffiti in a West Bank village near Ramallah overnight, according to Palestinian media. The suspected crime took place in Ein Yabrud. The conflict in the West Bank, always at a low boil, but are appearances deceiving in that it seems to be on a higher flame in the past several weeks?
After Palestinian media reported a series of Israeli airstrikes in eastern Gaza City, the IDF said it is conducting routine activity to demolish Hamas infrastructure in the Israeli-controlled area. In addition to the tunnel demolitions, there are almost daily incidents in which Gazans attempt to cross the Yellow Line from the Hamas-ruled side. Fabian gives several scenarios for the attempted crossings.
Earlier in the month, Fabian visited Hamas’s “most complex” tunnel network in the Gaza Strip, where, eventually, the remains of Lt. Hadar Goldin were recovered. He was killed and abducted by the terror group in 2014, and it transpires that he was held some two kilometers from the Israeli border.
Check out The Times of Israel's ongoing liveblog for more updates.
For further reading:
US, French, Saudi officials to meet in Paris about preventing renewed war in Lebanon
IDF postpones planned strike on alleged Hezbollah site as Lebanese army searches it
IDF drops charges against reserve officer over deadly Lebanon incident last year
Settlers said to torch vehicle, spray graffiti in attack on West Bank village
Scouring massive labyrinth under Rafah, IDF just missed finding Hadar Goldin’s body
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IMAGE: An officer with the elite Yahalom unit is seen inside a tunnel in the Rafah area of the southern Gaza Strip, where the body of Lt. Hadar Goldin was held, December 8, 2025. (Emanuel Fabian/Times of Israel)
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Welcome to the Times of Israel's daily briefing. Today is Wednesday, December 17th, day 803 of the war. I'm Amanda Borschelle Dan here with our military correspondent, Emmanuel Fabian. Mani, thanks so much for joining me today. |
| 0:17.8 | Hi, Amanda. The Lebanon front may be heating up. We'll hear what has |
| 0:21.9 | been going on over the past weeks, and Manny will weigh in on the likelihood of another concentrated |
| 0:27.6 | IDF operation across the border. We'll hear also what is happening on the ground in Gaza, |
| 0:33.5 | and late in the program, take a deep dive into the tunnel tunnel near Rafach that held the remains of Lieutenant Hadar Golden for years and years. |
| 0:45.1 | All of this and more when we're back. |
| 0:52.3 | This episode is brought to you by the Jewish Communal Fund, the largest and most active Jewish donor-advised fund in the country. |
| 1:00.5 | What is the donor-advised fund? Think of it as a personal, charitable investment account. |
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| 1:53.1 | Learn more at jcfn.org. |
| 1:56.6 | That's JCF, the Jewish Communal Fund, |
| 2:06.2 | where giving back means building the Jewish future. What does it mean to face darkness and still choose light? |
| 2:10.1 | In this special episode of Wondering Jews with Mihal and Noam, |
| 2:13.5 | recorded and released just days after the devastating Bondi Beach terrorist attack, Mihal |
| 2:19.0 | and Noam sit down with Rabbi Dr. Benji Levy to talk about the Australian Jewish community, |
| 2:25.2 | their history and resilience at this critical moment, and more broadly, about the eternal |
... |
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