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Across the global news media, the number of Gazans killed or injured ticks up every day at horrific speeds. Almost never reported however is the Israeli Defense Forces casualties in their 10-month genocide in Gaza.
Now, as changes to the mandatory military service laws seem poised to pass in Israel’s Knesset, and as frontline IDF personnel are having their service terms lengthened abruptly and without explanation, Israel media are reporting that the IDF has as many as 20,000 wounded, with 8,000 designated as disabled.
Israeli Newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth reported that 10,000 IDF soldiers have been killed or wounded since the genocide in Gaza began. It claimed further than this has averaged out to around 1,000 per month.
Channel 12, another Israeli media outlet, reports that by July 2024, 20,000 IDF members had been injured, with 8,298 being classified as disabled.
If true, and assuming a typical 4-1 wounded-to-killed ratio, then the IDF has sustained around the same amount killed and wounded in 9 months in Gaza as the US sustained during the entire occupation of Iraq from 2003 to 2011.
These are the first reports detailing the scale of the IDF’s losses, and also seem to confirm that aside from Hamas there are multiple resistance groups returning fire and setting traps inside Gaza.
The Palestine Chronicle reports that according to official Israeli data which is subject to military censorship, just 690 Israeli officers and soldiers have been killed since October 7th. Even more so than in Ukraine, where casualty numbers are humorously played down, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant has every reason and necessity to hide the costs of the genocide, as it is likely the only reason Benjamin Netanyahu is still in office, and also because the IDF has killed or failed to rescue one third all of the hostages taken by Hamas on October 7th.
Additionally, IDF commanders have already stated that the genocide as it’s being carried out is not capable of destroying Hamas as a terrorist entity.
Expanded conscription and service terms
While neither Channel 12 nor Yedioth Ahronoth cited sources for their claims, observers can look at certain actions by the IDF and see those of an agency that may be short-handed. In June, the Knesset voted to advance a new conscription law that allowed those of ultra-orthodox families to have their sons conscripted for the IDF, but centrist and militarist parties said the legislation didn’t go far enough to expand the draft. In other words, the IDF needs more soldiers.
Additionally, in the piece by Yedioth Ahronoth, parents of IDF soldiers said that deployment extensions are being issued without explanation or advance notice.
“There has never been such a situation in the history of wars Israel, not even in 1948, in which soldiers fight in enemy territory, under unconditional conditions, ten months in a row,” said a parent of a soldier in the Nahal Brigade, which currently operates in Rafah. “Our sons are taken for granted and they are ashamed to complain officially”.
The mother of a female reconnaissance soldier in the occupied Golan Heights of Syria said her daughter was told in the first week of August she would spend another 4 months at her post even though she and the rest of her unit were slated for rotation out in September.
Nearly 40,000 Palestinian civilians have been killed in Gaza, and between 90,000 and 100,000 have been injured. These are considered low estimates by the Gazan Health Ministry as it doesn’t include those missing. WaL
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PICTURED ABOVE: In this still from a video released by the Al Qassam Brigade, three IDF soldiers position themselves outside a building before entering and being blown apart by concealed bombs.
