Injured Israeli soldiers have reportedly refused a visit from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at a hospital in Tel Aviv.
The Israeli Channel 13 reported that the soldiers at the Sheba Hospital in Ramat Gan would not meet with the prime minister, according to the Middle-East Monitor (MEMO).
According to the Israeli military, 464 soldiers have been killed since the October 7 operation by the resistance group, Hamas, with 132 of them dying since the beginning of the ground invasion began in late October.
On Tuesday evening, the Israeli army announced the death of Reserve First Sergeant Ma’oz Benjstein, who served in the commando unit, in a battle in the northern Gaza Strip, MEMO reports.
"In this ongoing battle, the cloak of invincibility has fallen, and the weaker fighter is proving that intelligence, heart and preparation, will overcome even the toughest of challenges. "
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‘Graveyard for Invaders’
Abu Obeida, the military spokesman for the Al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Hamas, has said that the estimates provided by the Israeli army are “unreal,” and that the numbers of casualties are much higher.
In a statement last Wednesday, Hamas said that the Mujahideen of the Al-Qassam Brigades “are fulfilling their promise to make Gaza a graveyard for the invaders.”
The statement came after the Israeli army admitted to the death of ten soldiers, most of them officers, in a battle in Shejaiya, east of Gaza. The admission “confirms the extent of the loss and failure of the leaders of the entity and its army in confronting the might of the resistance and Al-Qassam Brigades,” the statement added.
“We say to the Zionists that your failed leadership has no regard for the lives of your soldiers, and you have no choice but to withdraw from Gaza,” the statement concluded.
In a just-released video, Al-Qassam Brigades fighters are seen clashing with Israeli military vehicles and soldiers in the axes of the city of Khan Younis, in southern Gaza.
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— The Palestine Chronicle (@PalestineChron) December 20, 2023
On November 18, David Oren Baruch, the director of Mount Herzl Military Cemetery, complicated the Israeli War Council’s mission of hiding the actual number of Israeli casualties when he revealed that one Israeli soldier is buried every one hour to one hour and a half in the military cemetery.
The Palestine Chronicle explored the question surrounding Israel’s military casualties in an Op-Ed, dated December 10.
According to Gaza’s Ministry of Health, 19,667 Palestinians have been killed and 52,586 wounded in Israel’s ongoing genocide in Gaza starting on October 7. Palestinian and international estimates say that the majority of those killed and wounded are women and children.
(PC, MEMO)
