The Israel Defense Forces said it had opened an investigation into the deadly incident, which it said happened when the soldiers were hit by tank cross-fire in Jabalia.
The Israeli military said Thursday that five soldiers were killed and seven injured in a friendly fire incident in northern Gaza, amid renewed battles in the area against regrouped Hamas militants.
"An initial investigation into the deaths of five IDF soldiers reveals that IDF tanks, located dozens of meters away, identified a weapon and fired shells at an IDF force nearby," the IDF said in a statement.
"This force had entered the northern part of Gaza and occupied buildings along a logistic route. The tanks fired two shells for unclear reasons, resulting in seven more soldiers being injured, three severely."
It's always unfortunate when friendly fire happens... in this particular case the soldiers were mistaken for Palestinian civilians and it was ethically impossible for the other soldiers not to shoot. /s
This just seems to me like poorly trained young people are being forced to go into a fight they’re not fit to fight. The people who are sending them in to die like this should be held accountable.
Article says the current friendly fire rate is 15% of all Israeli casualties, which is high for a modern military. Not a statistician so I don't know if it's unusually high, and also the relatively low number of IDF casualties may contribute to the high ratio, but there seems to be a common thread. IDF communication SUCKS.
Do we know the number of IDF soldiers involved in total to arrive at the friendly fire casualties? Are we approaching more Israeli deaths from Friendly Fired than from Israeli citizens that were victims of Hamas in the original incursion on Oct 6th?
First question I think is misunderstanding the claim. To clarify, according to the article, 15% of all IDF casualties are from friendly fire, not 15% of ALL soldiers have been friendly fired.
The second one? Nah. IDF's total casualties are only like 6 or 700.
The Israeli military said Thursday that five soldiers were killed and seven injured in a friendly fire incident in northern Gaza, amid renewed battles in the area against regrouped Hamas militants.
The Israel Defense Forces said it had opened an investigation into the deadly incident, which it said happened when the soldiers were hit by tank cross-fire in Jabalia.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has come under growing pressure from the U.S. to lay out a plan for post-war Gaza, and on Wednesday he faced rare public criticism on the issue from within his own War Cabinet.
Still, Netanyahu insists the focus must be on invading Rafah, where his troops have intensified operations since calling on residents of the city's east to evacuate last week.
The U.N.’s top court opens two days of hearings on Thursday into South Africa's call to halt Israeli operations in Rafah.
The U.S. Central Command said early Thursday it had successfully anchored a temporary humanitarian pier to a beach in Gaza to increase the flow of aid.
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