Gaza tunnel (file)
Gaza tunnel (file)Flash 90

Less than one year after Operation Protective Edge in Gaza fizzled out, Hamas is already building new terror tunnels under Israel.

But while the evidence that terror activity has resumed has been lingering for months, sources now say that the terror group has taken the digging to the next level. 

Hamas has switched from manual slave labor to machinery to dig terror tunnels under Israel, Palestinian Arab sources revealed to Walla! News Wednesday. 

The group is using a Bagger 288, a German-produced mining machine known as a bucket-wheel excavator. 

A damning letter emerged from Gaza in August 2014 from a Palestinian Arab who was forced to dig terror tunnels after he accepted a cryptic job offer from Hamas; the group plucked him from his home in a truck and forced him down into a tunnel. At least 160 Palestinian Arab children have also died digging terror tunnels, the same report revealed. 

Unlike workers working by hand, however, the Bagger can dig far faster and burrow into smaller spaces, the sources revealed. 

In addition, bulldozers can clearly be seen from the Israeli side of the border doing at least part of the digging and cleanup; Hamas is using a mixture of cement (when available) and wooden boards for the construction. 

Senior security sources confirmed the report, adding that Hamas's true aim is to dig the tunnels at high speed and that they are focusing on producing short-range rockets and mortars - which are more difficult for the Iron Dome Missile Defense System to shoot down.