Two Israel Defense Forces soldiers were killed and seven wounded, all of them seriously, when an Israeli Air Force helicopter crashed in the southern Gaza Strip on Tuesday night.
The fatalities were named as Sgt. Maj. (res.) Daniel Alloush, 37, from Tel Aviv; and Sgt. Maj. (res.) Tom Ish-Shalom, 38, from Moshav Nes Harim.
Both served in the IAF’s elite Unit 669.
According to a preliminary military probe, the UH-60 Black Hawk crashed en route to Rafah to bring a medical team to evacuate a seriously wounded soldier.
“It appears that the crash was not caused by enemy fire, and the cause is still being investigated,” the IDF said.
There have been no changes to IAF activities over the Gaza Strip.
The death toll among Israeli troops since the start of the IDF ground incursion in Gaza on Oct. 27 now stands at 340, and at 706 on all fronts since the Hamas-led Oct. 7 massacre, according to official military data.
Additionally, Chief Inspector Arnon Zamora, a member of the Border Police’s Yamam National Counter-Terrorism Unit, was fatally wounded during a hostage-rescue mission in Gaza in June, and civilian defense contractor Liron Yitzhak was mortally wounded in May.
