The Israeli occupation army has admitted that 600 of its occupation forces have been killed since the onset of Operation al-Aqsa Storm in October last year, the largest military operation by the Palestinian resistance groups against the occupied territories in decades.
Daniel Hagari, the Israeli military spokesman, announced on Friday and said 3,193 soldiers have been injured since then, of whom 268 are still under treatment and the condition of 26 soldiers is critical.
Hagari also said five Israeli forces had been killed in clashes in the besieged Gaza Strip over the past 24 hours.
Yoav Gallant, the Israeli minister for military affairs, has on several occasions highlighted the heavy toll the war has been inflicting on the regime’s military.
“We are paying a very high price in our ranks…The costs we incur in terms of the numbers of deaths and injuries are very high,” Gallant said in a televised address in February.
Recently, the Israeli military has proposed changes to the army draft law as it prepares for a protracted war in the Gaza Strip.
The amendments include raising terms for male mandatory army service and female soldiers in combat and other special roles to three years. Currently, men serve for two years and eight months and women for two years.
Despite causing a massive death toll and suffering fatalities, the Israeli military has stopped short of achieving the goals that it has been seeking to score through the war, such as “destroying” Hamas, finding the captives that the Gaza-based resistance movement is holding, and bringing about forced displacement of the Palestinian territory’s population to neighboring Egypt.
More than 180 days into the war, the illegal entity claimed the lives of at least 33,091 people in Gaza and injured 75,750 others, mostly women and children.
Tel Aviv has also blocked water, food, and electricity to Gaza, plunging the coastal strip into a humanitarian crisis.
Source: Press TV
