(JNS) The Israel Defense Forces announced earlier this week that it had destroyed a Hamas tunnel in the Gaza Strip intended to transport terrorists into the Jewish State.

While the tunnel crossed into Israeli territory, it did not penetrate the military’s underground security barrier and therefore did not pose an immediate threat to border-area residents, the IDF said.

“We were aware of this tunnel but we waited for [Operation Breaking Dawn] to be over before we acted,” said an Israeli military spokesman according to Reuters, in reference to last week’s conflict between the IDF and Palestinian Islamic Jihad.

The “pretty advanced” tunnel was destroyed in a “non-kinetic” manner, the spokesman said.

For his part, Hamas spokesman Fawzi Barhoum told Reuters that the development was the latest in a series of “false achievements” by Israel, adding that his Gaza-based terror group maintained “the right to use all means to reinforce and develop its capabilities.”

The conflict with PIJ ended on August 7 at 11:30 p.m. local time, when an Egypt-mediated ceasefire came into effect.