The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) on Tuesday confirmed that an officer was killed in fighting in Gaza City. According to the IDF, Major Shahar Netanel Bozaglo, a company commander in the 7th Armored Brigade’s 77th Battalion, was killed on Monday. 911 IDF personnel killed since October 7 The 27-year-old was injured after a Hamas RPG hit one of the 77th Battalion’s tanks, an initial probe of the IDF said. Major Bozaglo was taken to a hospital, where his condition worsened until he succumbed to his injuries. According to The Times of Israel, he was the first soldier to be killed in the IDF’s new offensive against Hamas in Gaza City, launched last week. With this, the number of IDF personnel killed on the battlefield since the launch of the anti-Hamas operation on October 7, 2023, has risen to 911. 38 people killed in Gaza in 24 hours Meanwhile, in Gaza, the Health Ministry said that 38 people were killed and 190 were wounded over the past 24 hours in the Gaza Strip. The already dire humanitarian situation in Gaza took a turn for the worse last week after the IDF launched Operation Gideon’s Chariots II, the ground offensive to take control of Gaza City. Gaza City is the capital of the Gaza Strip and used to house Hamas' most powerful battalions before the war. Earlier, Israel had called on Gaza City’s roughly 1 million Palestinian residents to flee ahead of the launch of the operation, which the IDF estimates to last at least a few months. So far, according to the IDF estimates, some 640,000 Palestinians have left Gaza City, and many more are expected to move out in the coming days. Israeli tanks deep inside Gaza City On Tuesday, Palestinian media outlets published videos showing an Israeli tank on al-Shifa Street in the upscale Rimal neighbourhood in western Gaza, an area with several high-rise buildings, many of which had already been struck in preparation for the operation. According to a Reuters report, there was a “significant push” by Israeli tanks toward western Gaza City. Israeli forces reportedly detonated vehicles loaded with explosives in the Sabra and Tel al-Hawa neighbourhoods, destroying dozens of homes and damaging roads. Western recognition of Palestine fails to slow down Israel The escalations come a day after several Western countries recognised a Palestinian state at the ongoing UN General Assembly, a landmark diplomatic shift after nearly two years of war that faces fierce resistance from Israel and its close ally, the United States. Israel says the moves will undermine the prospects of a peaceful end to the war in the Palestinian enclave, much of it devastated by Israeli air strikes and a humanitarian crisis, including widespread hunger. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has also dismissed the criticism of the military campaign and said the war will not stop until Hamas is eliminated. But he has not produced a plan for shattered Gaza after the war ends. The Israeli government has declared there will be no Palestinian state, which was the cornerstone of the two-state solution embedded in the 1993 Oslo Accords.
