The IDF’s Shaldag special forces, led by Lt. Col. “B”, were crucial in retaking Israel’s South on October 7, but will probably be most remembered in history for their role in taking control of possibly Hamas’s most crucial asset, Shifa Hospital.
On Monday, B described Shaldag’s strategy and operations for taking over Shifa second by second to a small closed briefing of military reporters.
He noted that Shaldag decided purposely to enter the Shifa complex by blowing through a wall to catch any potential Hamas terrorists more by surprise.
Verbally and watching real-time video, Shaldag forces could be seen moving from room to room and facility to facility finding Hamas military items.
Often, specially trained Oketz dogs went ahead first to locate potential boobytraps or potential Hamas terrorists waiting in ambush.
After checking floor -2 and the other floors of the Qatari and other facilities, Shaldag, Oketz, Yahalom, and others started to locate and penetrate Hamas’s vast underground tunnel network around Shifa.
A video showed and B described the finding of weapons in many vehicles, eventually reaching a total of around 70.
At another moment, an arrested and partially wounded Hamas terrorist could be seen on video being interrogated in real time on hospital grounds by Unit 504 and Shin Bet interrogators.
Special orders were given to keep some of the Hamas forces alive specifically to gather intelligence.
B said that every single facility in the complex had concealed Hamas weapons, intelligence, or both.
Further, he said that the MRI facility had the most of all of the military items, displaying video of the dramatic moments when IDF forces first found weapons next to the MRI machine – even before IDF spokespeople and BBC media representatives started to show off the findings to the world.
Multiple Shaldag officers said that a mix of Palestinian patients and doctors (keeping their identities anonymous so as not to endanger them) signaled to IDF forces in many areas where Hamas had hidden military items.
Often these Palestinians would do so by flagging which areas they had been told were off-limits to them by Hamas.
Interestingly enough, multiple Shaldag officers said that they believed top leadership from Hamas had been in the Shifa tunnels, and not merely battalion commanders as described by IDF Chief Spokesman Brig. Gen. Daniel Hagari.
They said that the extent of the ceramic construction for the rooms, the modern air conditioning, and other items were multiple steps above other tunnel command areas in other places for battalion-level commanders.
Moreover, B said that the Outpatient Building had unequivocal traces that hostages and bodies had been held there before the Shaldag entered the grounds.
He said that you could even smell the leftover odor of bodies that had been there, but which were then moved.
Hamas left long before IDF began Shifa siege?
The Shaldag forces said they did not know how, when, or where Hamas forces had fled.
Apparently, no forces were put in place to thwart a mass flight by Hamas forces, and many believe that Hamas left long before the IDF started its five-day siege of Shifa.
B said that his Shaldag forces also regularly acted over time in the North, including substantial operations, and not just going after one or two Hezbollah anti-tank missile groups.
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