IDF said the crossing is used by Gazans daily to enter Israel for work and medical treatment in Israeli hospitals.

"This massive tunnel system branches out and spans well over four kilometers (2.5 miles). Its entrance is located only 400 meters (1,310 feet) from the Erez Crossing," the IDF posted on X.

"This tunnel system was a project led by Mohammad Sinwar, the brother of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar, and the commander of Hamas’ Khan Yunis Battalion," read the post.

Meanwhile, UN workers delivering medical supplies to the Al-Shifa Hospital in north Gaza on  December 16 have described the emergency department as a “bloodbath”, with hundreds of injured people inside, and a constant flow of new patients.

According to the team, Patients with trauma injuries were being sutured on the floor, limited to no pain management is available at the hospital, and the emergency department is so full that workers must take care not to step on patients on the floor.

Al-Shifa Hospital, formerly the most important and largest referral hospital in Gaza, is now barely functioning: the operating theatres and other major services are not working due to lack of fuel, oxygen, specialized medical staff, and supplies. The hospital is only able to provide basic trauma stabilization, and has no blood for transfusion.

A handful of doctors and nurses, and some 70 volunteers, are working under what WHO staff described as “unbelievably challenging circumstances” in a hospital “in need of resuscitation.”