HEAVY DEFEAT: 14 zionist troopers killed, wounded in resistance operation in central Gaza
At least three Israeli soldiers have been killed and nearly a dozen others wounded in a war zone in the central part of the Gaza Strip, as Palestinian resistance forces continue to inflict losses on Israeli occupation forces across the war-ravaged coastal sliver.
Israeli media outlets reported that the three slain reserve soldiers were members of the 99th Division of the Israeli Army. They lost their lives in the vicinity of the Netzarim checkpoint, which separates northern and southern Gaza. Another eleven Israeli troops sustained injuries as well.
There were reports that some of the Israeli troops were evacuated by helicopters, while others were still getting treated in the field.
The al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of the Palestinian resistance group Hamas, announced that it targeted the Israeli command center in Netzarim with heavy-caliber mortar shells.
In a statement, the group said its fighters lured a mechanized Israeli force and struck it with unexploded ordnance and munitions, which the occupation troops had earlier used against Palestinians in al-Sikka Street of the al-Mughraqa neighborhood in central Gaza.
The Israeli military has so far confirmed some 260 deaths among its troops since the launch of a ground invasion of Gaza.
Meanwhile, at least 30 Israeli paratrooper reservists have refused to answer their call-up to participate in a planned ground attack on Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip.
Israeli Channel 12 reported that the reservists said they didn’t feel able to take part in their duties.
Despite international warnings about a planned Israeli invasion of Rafah, the Israeli army insists on going ahead with attacking the city, which is home to more than 1.4 million displaced Palestinians.
Israel launched the war on Gaza on October 7 after Palestinian resistance groups carried out a surprise retaliatory operation into the occupied territories.
Concomitantly with the war, the regime has been enforcing a near-total siege on the coastal territory, which has reduced the flow of foodstuffs, medicine, electricity, and water into the Palestinian territory into a trickle.
So far during the military onslaught, the regime has killed at least 34,454 Gazans, most of them women, children, and adolescents.
