Behind the battle that claimed nine Israeli soldiers in northern Gaza Strip

The soldiers killed in Shujaiyeh fell victim to a coordinated ambush that began when terrorist militants fired on an IDF force operating in the area. Once concern arose that they might be abducted to nearby tunnels, another force arrived to extract the soldiers and encountered a similar ambush

Ten Israeli soldiers were killed in battles in the northern Gaza Strip on Tuesday. Nine of them were killed in combat in the neighborhood of Shujaiyeh: Seven of them from the Golani Brigade, and two from the 669 Search and Rescue Unit.

Another soldier from the combat engineering corps was killed in a separate battle in a different part of the northern Gaza Strip.

Shujaiyeh

Four other soldiers were severely wounded in the battles: one of them in the Shujaiyeh battle, and three others were injured in confrontations in other areas within the Gaza Strip.

The soldiers killed in Shujaiyeh fell victim to a coordinated ambush that began when terrorist militants fired on a Golani force operating in the area.

As the soldiers approached the building they were fired upon, gunfire erupted, followed by an explosive charge and grenades hurled at them. Four of the soldiers were injured, losing communication. Concern arose that they might be abducted to nearby tunnels.

Another force arrived to extract the soldiers and encountered a similar ambush, facing gunfire and explosive charges. A third force attempting to locate the stranded soldiers also faced combat. The battles persisted until the soldiers were rescued with the assistance of air support and artillery.

The soldiers killed from the Golani are Tomer Grinberg, 35, from Almog, and the commander of the Golani Brigade's 13th Battalion; Major Roei Meldas, 23, from Afula; Major Moshe Avram Bar On, 23, from Ra'anana; Sergeant Achia Daskal, 19, from Haifa; Captain Liel Hayo, 22, from Shoham; Col. (res.) Itzhak Ben Basat, 44, from Sde Ya'avok; Sgt. Eran Aloni, 19, from Ofakim.Itzhak Ben BasatCredit: Binyamin Regional CouncilI

Those killed from unit 669 are Major Ben Shelly, 26, from Kidron; Rom Hecht, 20, from Givatayim.

From the Combat Engineering force, Sergeant Oriya Yaakov, 19, from Ashkelon, a soldier in Battalion 614, was killed.

Since the beginning of the war, dozens of fighters from the 13th Battalion under Greenberg's command have been killed.

A month ago, Greenberg spoke about his soldiers: "They've been saying lately that they'll be the Yom Kippur War generation 2. We must remember that after the surprise, the Yom Kippur War generation attacked and won. Not in the first attack, but in the second counter-attack, they triumphed. We will also finish like that."

Greenberg recounted the battle where his soldiers rescued Roee and Guy Berdichevsky, ten-month-old twins, from the October 7 massacre in Kibbutz Kfar Azza, after their parents, Itai and Hadar, were murdered.

In an interview with Channel 13 News in October, he described: "We arrive at the house. I burst in. I see a mom dressed in pajamas, shot in the living room. I rush to the children's room, see a dad lying with a bullet in his head. In a crib, two twins wrapped up, not crying. We lift them, alive, healthy, cradle them. We all had tears in our eyes. I thought about my daughter back at home."

Israel's military edge over Hamas is blunted in northern Gaza's crowded urban areas

The Shujaiyeh neighborhood in eastern Gaza City is Hamas' last remaining stronghold in the northern Gaza Strip and the site of continued intense fighting.

The Israel Defense Forces remain far from establishing control of the area. In the Jabalya refugee camp resistance has diminished somewhat in recent days. In other areas in the north, where the army gained control a while back, troops are engaged in constant search operations for tunnels, arms and hideouts.

From time to time, there are small firefights, which testify to the fact that the organization's fighters continue to operate in the area. In southern Gaza, the focus of IDF operations continues to be the Khan Yunis area and the territorial division of Hamas operating in the city.

The videos of fighting that the IDF spokesperson release reflect a complex picture. Soldiers coming back from Gaza talk about slow and calculated advances, which means a lot of their time is spent waiting for orders to take the next bit of territory.

The combat itself by infantry and to a large degree also tanks, takes place at very close range and in heavily built-up areas, only some of which has been destroyed. The built-up areas, together with many tunnels still in use, enable groups of Hamas fighters to engage the IDF, in some cases at a distance of just a few meters.

These conditions reduce some of the IDF's relative advantage in technology and intelligence, and raise the number of Israeli casualties. This is all evident in the footage released Tuesday evening, in which a soldier from the Combat Engineering Corps Yahalom commando unit kills two terrorists at point-blank range inside an apartment while being injured by grenade shrapnel.

The spectators at home must have admired the soldier's bravery and composure but may have also asked themselves if there wasn't another, somewhat safer way, to handle the danger.

The offensive operation is being conducted hand in hand with an effort to locate the bodies of hostages. Earlier in the week, the bodies of Golani Warrant Officer Ziv Dado and Eden Zechariah, who was at the Nova festival, were discovered. The two were killed during the October 7 attack and their bodies taken by Hamas to Gaza. Since then the IDF has been searching for the two bodies. During the operation to retrieve the bodies last week, two reservists from the 551st Paratroopers Brigade were killed, Eyal Berkowitz and Gal Eisenkot.

However, it appears that further progress on another round of hostage negotiations has not started. The Qatari mediators, and the other countries involved in the talks, have been trying to craft a new deal that would include the release of some of the 137 hostages that remain captive. The order of priorities are women, sick and injured men, and elderly men. For now, however, Hamas has not exhibited any sign of urgency in coming to a deal.

Last month's hostage deal had been critical for Hamas because it needed a cease-fire to recover and reorganize its forces. Now that the northern part of the Gaza Strip is already largely under IDF control and most of Hamas' fighters have retreated, the organization's leadership feels no need to act. Top Hamas officials have said in recent days that more abductees will only be released as part of an overall deal, in which all the Palestinian prisoners imprisoned in Israel are released. There are no signs right now that Hamas feels that its bargaining power in future negotiations has diminished.

However, despite the harsh conditions the hostages are suffering (more than 20 of them have been declared dead by the IDF), it does not appear that Israel's leadership is in any hurry to reach a deal. One reason is political pressure: Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu fears the possible reaction of his far-right coalition partners to any kind of deal that is seen as surrendering to Hamas demands and disrupting the ground campaign.

Hamas' biggest enabler
An additional determination voiced by service members has to do with the enormous amounts of weapons and improvised bombs that are found. Entire neighborhoods in the Gaza Strip served Hamas as military zones, where it carried out, under the cover of the Palestinian civilians, its defenses against an Israeli invasion. The preparation includes wholesale booby-trapping of homes as well as massive arms caches.

At the same time, great effort was put into digging the tunnel network, the size and sophistication of which exceed anything Israeli intelligence had anticipated, alongside the manufacture and smuggling of weapons.

Most of the smuggled arms arrived through the tunnels between the two parts of Rafah, and it is not clear how much Egypt's deliberate disregard contributed to the smuggling industry. But the biggest enabler of the Hamas project was Qatar. The billions of dollars it poured into the Strip were meant to help the impoverished population, but in practice they freed Hamas from the burden of worrying about the civilians.

Moreover, The New York Times reported this week that the Israeli intelligence community recently discovered that Qatar transferred money directly to the military arm of Hamas, yet the Israeli government did not act to stop the monthly payments from Doha to Gaza City.

Netanyahu, who bears the main responsibility for this – and for the total Israeli failure in handling the Strip, for about 15 years – continues to confuse and mislead the public. The prime minister is deep into a political campaign, and his main message to Israelis is that only he can thwart the American plot to involve the Palestinian Authority in the administration of the Strip, if and when the Hamas regime there is defeated.

Netanyahu issues emphatic statements on the matter daily, alongside bizarre scorekeeping vis-a-vis his political rivals. Monday he was busy trying to prove that the number of people killed during the Oslo Accords process, over a decade and more, is similar to the number of victims of the October 7 attack (although it is not clear how such a numerical comparison serves him).

The prime minister's statement may perhaps give more clarity to U.S. President Joe Biden's remark, at a Hanukkah reception at the White House Monday evening, that he once gave Netanyahu a photograph and wrote at the top: "I love you but I don't agree with a damn thing you had to say." (The first part can be attributed to excessive American politeness.) Biden also said at the reception that Netanyahu would have to make changes to the composition of his government and warned of a loss of global support for Israel. Nevertheless, the president continues to justify the Israeli attack in response to October 7 massacre by Hamas and to oppose a cease-fire at present.

Despite all the somewhat contradictory statements, it seems that the lines of agreement between the United States and Israel are still quite clear. If Israel continues to accede to American demands, above all a massive flow of humanitarian aid to Gazans, the United States will permit the IDF's extensive operation in the Strip for some time to come.

Netanyahu was forced to back down, contrary to his previous statements, and also allow the introduction of a large amount of fuel into the Strip, some of which clearly goes to Hamas. But his latest statements, along with his refusal to engage in the diplomatic end game, continue to create tension with Washington. This will be expressed Thursday when Biden's national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, is expected to return to Israel and the region for a visit.

Sullivan will need to address the quickly escalating situation in the Red Sea. The Houthis in Yemen attacked another ship on Tuesday, this time one sailing under the Norwegian flag, and threatened to entirely shut the Bab al-Mandab Strait to ships heading to Israel. The problem is not only an Israeli one, as senior IDF officials say. Some 13 percent of global shipping traffic passes through the Suez Canal and the Red Sea, the shorter sailing route between the West and the Far East. A determined international coalition will be needed to fight this phenomenon, as was done a decade ago in the case of the Somali pirates attacking ships in the same region.

Impact on reservists
As families lit Hanukkah candles around Israel, it was clear to see who was missing – hundreds of thousands of reservists who are currently at the front lines or on military bases. For more than two months now, the very unusual security situation has weighted heavily on the home lives of families, many of whom are now starting to face financial insecurity as well.

What combat soldiers in compulsory service and the reserves have been experiencing is very unusual. This is not just because of the warfare in crowded, dangerous built-up areas, but also because of how long the combat has been continuing at this high intensity. The stress on the reservists by next year may resemble the situation in the first two years after the first Lebanon war broke out.

Conversations with reservists indicate high motivation to fight and strong belief in the justness of the war. But alongside this, there are also signs of exhaustion and questions regarding how long the war will go on and the expected outcome. Also notable is their harsh criticism regarding the conduct of the government, whose ministers are busy pillaging coalition funding, and which has been horribly slow and incompetent in handling the needs of the many Israelis harmed by the war.

It appears that the IDF General Staff headquarters still hasn't begun to internalize the extent of the war's impact on the reserves and the many implications of this. There's an integral difference between career soldiers and reservists, and even under normal circumstances this is hard to bridge. But now, the IDF needs to get moving and plan its reserve deployment for next year – and to ensure transparency with the reservists. Without an approach that is serious, organized and fair for reservist units, there could be a crisis that affects the functioning of these units as the war continues.

As Houthis threaten ships in the Red Sea, the West stumbles
Yemen's Houthi regime is capable of paralyzing the most important shipping lanes in the world through the Bab el-Mandab Strait, posing an intolerable threat for the U.S. and countries in the region

At least one Houthi missile hit a Norwegian ship, three days after the Houthis in Yemen announced that they intended to target any ship on route to Israel via the Red Sea.

The ship, called the STRINDA, was hit about 70 kilometers (43 miles) north of the Bab el-Mandeb Strait, a strategic maritime passage which separates the Red Sea from the Indian Ocean.

"This is a Yemeni veto of the American veto," Daifallah al-Shami, a Houthi government spokesman said, in reference to the attack and the American veto of a UN Security Council resolution calling for an immediate cease-fire in Israel's war with Hamas in Gaza.

For his part, the Houthi government's deputy prime minister for security affairs, Gen. Jalal al-Rowaishan, warned that the attacks would intensify as long as Israel's attacks in Gaza continued. The Houthi army, he said, has sufficient weaponry and intelligence to follow through on the threat anytime it wants.

In fact, Yemen has a stockpile of ballistic missiles including the Tankil, with a range of 500 kilometers (310 miles), and cruise missiles with ranges of between 80 and 300 kilometers. It has also been firing short-range missiles from speedboats, which complement the drones that they can use to track ship movements and to send information to those manning the missile launchers.

Yemen also has attack helicopters, such as the one used to take over the ship the Galaxy Leader in November. Their arsenal also includes torpedo bombs and naval mines and most importantly, the Yemenis benefit from close ties with the Iranian Revolutionary Guards' Quds Force, and equipment, weapons, technology and financial support from Iran.

The Houthis don't need aircraft carriers or modern fighter jets to paralyze one of the most important shipping lanes in the world. Their recent attacks were sufficient to spur maritime transportation firms to reroute their ships to the much trip around the Horn of Africa.

Attached File

In addition to its damaging effects on shipping to Israel, the immediate effects include increasing shipping costs and the cost of insurance against war risks. It also directly affects Egypt's revenues from the Suez Canal (which accommodates 12 percent of the world's trade and 8 percent of transportation of oil).

The United States, Israel, and the rest of the world don't have a clear response at the moment to the Houthi maritime threat. American warships have been cruising the Red Sea, and in August, they were supplemented by two naval vessels with a combined crew of 3,000.

France and Britain also have a military presence near the Bab el-Mandeb Strait – as does Israel. These forces have chalked up several successes in intercepting the Yemeni missiles and drones, but they still can't completely address the situation in the entire geographic region that the Houthis control.

The United States has been trying in recent weeks to assemble an international naval reaction force to deal with the threat, but the effort is proceeding slowly for the time being and the main partners that would be expected to participate – Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates – have still not assented to the plan.

The Saudis, who have vigorously renewed their ties with Iran, are close to signing a peace agreement with the Houthis. In a bid to avoid a crisis in the negotiations, Saudi Arabia has asked the United States to show "restraint" and not to carry out wide scale military action against the Houthis as long as the talks are underway.

In May, the UAE quit the military coalition that the United States established to protect shipping in the Persian Gulf, explaining that it preferred diplomatic solutions to military ones. The Emiratis haven't been in a hurry to join the new military coalition, which could again place the UAE in the Houthis bank of targets. This all comes about three years after the UAE signed an agreement with Iran and withdrew its forces from Yemen, halting the attacks on the UAE capital, Abu Dhabi.

The United States has a major interest in putting an end to the war in Yemen – which pits the Houthis against the Yemeni government recognized by the Saudis and Americans – or at least to establish a long –term cease-fire that would foster reconciliation between the two main parts of the country.

But in light of the Houthis' frequent attacks on shipping and the threat to international shipping lanes, the United States is having difficulty coming up with nonmilitary solutions. But even military ones pose difficulties. One potential target, for example, is the port of Hodeida, which the Houthis control and through which the country gets 70 percent of its consumer goods and oil. The port was subject to a total blockade until April, when the Houthis signed a cease-fire agreement with the "official" government of Yemen.

The port is one of the Houthis' main sources of revenue, from millions of dollars in fees and customs duties on the cargo that passes through it. Inflicting damage to the port could not only result in the suspension or even the rescission of agreements reached between the two sides. It would also put a halt to the arrival of essential supplies that millions of citizens living under Houthi rule depend upon.

Of course, beyond strategic targets such as Hodeida, there are secondary military targets such as radar stations, missile or military bases – or concentrations of Houthi forces. But they don't consist of an organized army of the type that hitting their primary facilities would take out of action.

The major threat is that joint Western military action would prompt the Houthis to inflict a painful response on targets in Saudi Arabia or even Jordan and drag the countries of the region and the Western forces into a prolonged war of attrition.

Another way of hitting the Houthis which has already been deployed is through financial sanctions against companies and individuals associated with the Houthis. This month the United States imposed such sanctions against 13 individuals and entities operating in Turkey, Russia, the UAE, and Iran, but it's doubtful they will have a real effect on the Houthis' base of financial support.

In addition to their revenues from the drug trade and port fees, the Houthi regime takes a 20 percent cut on commercial transactions in its "country" and another 4 to 15 percent on surgery at private hospitals. That's in addition to taxes that are not provided for by law.

It's not only the Houthis' cash flow that's difficult to control. Weapons reach the Houthi region, mainly from Iran, but they're also smuggled in from other countries. And it's difficult to track and stop arms ships and land-based smuggling convoys.

Of course, the Houthis link their attacks on ships in the Red Sea to the situation in Gaza and to what the Houthis declare is their participation in an axis of resistance that includes Hamas, other Palestinian groups, Hezbollah and Shi'ite militias in Iraq. But the concern is that even when the war in Gaza is over, the Houthis won't forgo the effective leverage that the Red Sea provides them to achieve diplomatic and political goals.

Commentators at media outlets in "legitimate" Yemen also think that the Houthis' decision to join the fighting in the Gaza war through attempted attacks on the southern Israeli port of Eilat have been an effort to halt major domestic criticism over their continued failure to stabilize the country's economy and to supply the population's needs.

It's also in the face of deep discrimination between those who are close to the regime and those who aren't. Some therefore think that an American attack on the Houthis and their military institutions would only help the Houthis by giving them a pretext to harm their political rivals.

This is a constellation of considerations that an international protection force in the Red Sea should take into account. And it doesn't leave a lot of room for an effective, immediate response that wouldn't endanger international shipping even more.

Hamas used toxic substance to kill Nahal Oz troops on Oct. 7, IDF probe said to show
Today, 9:59 am 29

An investigation into the nature of the deaths of IDF surveillance soldiers serving on the Nahal Oz base on October 7 has reportedly revealed that they were killed by a toxic gas that caused suffocation and loss of consciousness within a few minutes of exposure.

According to a report published by Channel 12, the main findings of the investigation indicated that an unspecified but toxic flammable substance was apparently thrown through the entrance of the building which housed the surveillance soldiers’ command center. One of the soldiers at the entrance to the building attempted to extinguish the flames but was unsuccessful and the fire continued to spread.

“They set fire to materials that ignited and spread, which contained toxic gases that could cause suffocation in a few minutes or even less than that,” Channel 12 quoted the officer delivering the report as saying, and added that the estimated time of a few minutes was an optimistic one.

As the fire continued to spread, the smoke began to enter the surveillance soldiers’ command center, where 22 people, including many of the surveillance soldiers, were hiding. In an attempt to ward off the smoke, the soldiers soaked some paper towels with water to fill the gap under the door but it didn’t work and the effects of the gas began to take hold.

“The soldiers began to leave the room and search for an exit. They were coughing and some couldn’t breathe,” the IDF officer told Channel 12. “Some told us that they felt they were stepping on some people, they tried to pick them up, and with the rest of their strength tried to call to them. They were simply surviving and trying to figure out how to get themselves out of there.”

When they reached the emergency exit, however, the soldiers realized that the door was on fire, and there was no way of opening it or even getting close to it. Those who were still able continued to search for an exit and eventually reached the bathrooms, where a small window led to the outside.

One of the officers climbed up to the window and smashed it, allowing him, five other officers and one surveillance soldier to escape the toxic inferno.

The attack on the Nahal Oz base, located less than a kilometer from the Gaza border, came at the start of the murderous assault carried out by Hamas, in which roughly 3,000 terrorists burst into Israel by land, air and sea under the cover of thousands of rockets. They infiltrated more than 20 communities across the south of the country, killing more than 1,200 people and seizing some 240 hostages. Families were slaughtered in their homes in front of their loved ones and some 360 people were mowed down at an outdoor music festival.

During the attack on the Nahal Oz base, 15 IDF surveillance soldiers were killed and six more were taken hostage.

One of the soldiers killed in the attack was Cpl. Shirel Mor, 19. Speaking to the Kan public broadcaster on Tuesday, her mother Edna Mor discussed the details surrounding her daughter’s death and directed strong criticism at those she holds responsible for it.

“It wasn’t only Hamas who killed our children. It was the government, the decision-makers in the army, they were also accomplices,” she said, adding that the “baseless hatred in the streets for eight months,” an apparent reference to the deep societal divisions over government’s contentious judicial overhaul, also played a role in the failure to protect the country against Hamas on October 7.

Following Shirel’s death, no senior officers visited Edna to deliver condolences or to discuss what had happened, she told Kan.

“They are afraid to come to us,” she said of the officers. “So who’s coming? The ones who are new there. The really senior ones, those who are in charge of the border, don’t come. They send junior officers.”

“It’s not that they’re ashamed. They don’t have any shame; if they didn’t guard our borders then they have no shame. They’re just afraid that we will finish them off here at home,” she added.

Describing Shirel as a person filled with joie de vivre, Edna said through tears, “She was put here for twenty years to educate me, her father, and her older sister and older brother. She contributed so much at home.

“How will I live? I had her at 40 years old; I gave myself a gift. They took her from me and they are guilty,” she told Kan. “I want to take all the rugs out of their cabinet, they’re always sweeping everything under the rug. I want those who are guilty to sit in prison. I, personally, and many other parents, will not accept resignations… they need to sit in prison without rank and without a pension.”