TEL AVIV (Dispatches) -- Hamas’s armed wing the Qassam Brigades has turned its “military disadvantage into an advantage” and is working to “throw the [Israeli] army off balance,” Maariv newspaper’s Avi Ashkenazi reported on Sunday, one day after an Israeli soldier was killed by resistance fighters for the first time in months.
“The serious incident that occurred yesterday afternoon in the northern Gaza Strip – in which a soldier was killed and five other soldiers were seriously injured – illustrates Hamas’s fighting doctrine … Hamas is currently trying to preserve what remains of its military power. It is not working to engage face-to-face battles against our forces,” he wrote, adding that Hamas is using guerilla tactics and its complex tunnel system instead. 
“Hamas understands that the army is operating at partial strength, sometimes even less, and therefore chooses to wait for the main confrontation, the big battle,” he went on to say. 
“Hamas is seizing territory, digging tunnels, and creating [booby] traps … At the same time, its men are … observing the forces’ activity and the routine of fighting, and waiting for an opportunity. When it comes, they … tail the forces,” and “hit them with anti-tank fire,” before escaping into tunnels, the Israeli journalist explains. 
The resistance fighters “using guerrilla tactics, turn their military disadvantage into a tactical advantage: firing from a distance, planting charges, and quickly escaping – this is the method by which they try to throw the army off balance,” he added. 
One Israeli soldier was killed and five others wounded in an ambush by the Qassam Brigades in Gaza’s northern city of Beit Hanoun on Saturday. According to an Israeli army probe, resistance fighters emerged from a tunnel and struck a vehicle carrying a group of soldiers. An explosive device was then detonated nearby the rescue forces who arrived at the scene.
“Our fighters targeted a Storm military jeep belonging to the command of the combat information gathering battalion in the Gaza Division with an anti-tank missile, inflicting confirmed injuries on them. Immediately after the arrival of the support force that rushed to the rescue, it was targeted with a TV 3 anti-personnel explosive device, killing and wounding its members,” the Qassam Brigades said in a statement released on Sunday afternoon. 
The fighters also “targeted a newly established position for the enemy forces in the area with four “RPG” missiles and showered it with a number of mortar shells,” it added.
Hamas’s armed wing also announced other ambushes via its media page on Telegram. 
“Qassam fighters managed to carry out a complex ambush against a Zionist force that had penetrated east of the Al-Tuffah neighborhood, east of Gaza City, killing and wounding its members,” the group said in a statement, also announcing another operation targeting a Merkava 4 tank and a D9 military bulldozer with two Al-Yassin 105 missiles, setting them on fire in the Jabal al-Surani area, east of the Al-Tuffah neighborhood.” 
The Qassam Brigades have reportedly launched a large recruitment campaign in Gaza aimed at enlisting tens of thousands of new fighters, according to a report by the Saudi channel Al-Hadath. 
Earlier this month, Hebrew reports said that the Israeli army has only destroyed 25 percent of Hamas’s tunnel system in Rafah, highlighting that the resistance group retains tens of thousands of fighters, contradicting previous claims by the military.
A military source cited by Maariv last week said Qassam Brigades fighters are refraining from fully engaging Zionists troops in order to save their strength, in preparation for a major escalation. 
The Israeli army said recently that, for now, it is holding off on a large-scale onslaught and is currently working to pressure Hamas in the ceasefire negotiations. No date has been set for the ‘big assault,’ which will be decided by the political establishment and is being prepared for on the ground by the military. 
However, Israel faces a crisis with its reserve forces. Many are fatigued and have lost the will to serve. According to sources who spoke to Ynet in April, only 60 to 70 percent of reservists being called up are actually reporting for duty, and there are fears that these numbers will not increase if a full offensive on Gaza is ordered.