Seven Israel Defense Forces troops were wounded, four seriously, in the southern Gaza Strip on Monday.
According to an initial investigation, the soldiers from the IDF’s 205th “Iron Fist” Reserve Armored Brigade’s 9215th Battalion were wounded when a terrorist threw a grenade towards them in the southern city of Rafah.
The fighters returned fire, killing the assailant.
In addition to the four who were seriously hurt, two were listed as being in moderate condition, and one was lightly wounded. All were evacuated for immediate medical treatment in Israel, and their families were informed, the military said.
Hamas’s Al-Qassam Brigades “military” wing claimed earlier on Monday that it had attacked IDF soldiers in the Zalata area, east of Rafah.
IDF ground forces entered the Gaza Strip on Oct. 27 following weeks of airstrikes in response to the Hamas-led Oct. 7 massacre, in which Arab terrorists murdered some 1,200 people, wounded thousands more, and abducted more than 250 men, women and children to the enclave.
The death toll among Israeli troops since the start of the Gaza ground incursion on Oct. 27 stands at 329, and at 689 on all fronts since the Hamas-led Oct. 7 massacre, according to official military data.
In addition, Ch. Insp. Arnon Zamora, a member of the Border Police’s Yamam National Counter-Terrorism Unit, was fatally wounded in June during a mission to rescue four Israeli hostages in the central Gaza Strip, and civilian defense contractor Liron Yitzhak was mortally wounded in the southern Gaza Strip in May.
