IDF reservist killed, senior officer wounded in clash with gunmen in northern Gaza

An Israel Defense Forces reserve soldier was killed and a senior officer was seriously wounded during fighting in the northern Gaza Strip on Tuesday, the military announced the following morning, bringing Israel’s toll in the ground offensive against Hamas in Gaza and military operations along the border with the Strip to 379.

The slain soldier was named as Sgt. First Class (res.) Roi Sasson, 21, of the Kfir Brigade’s Nahshon Battalion, from the Jerusalem suburb of Mevaseret.

The battalion’s commander, Lt. Col. Yoel Glickman, was seriously wounded in the same incident. According to an initial IDF probe, the two were hit in an exchange of fire with gunmen in the Beit Lahiya area.

Sasson’s death brought the total number of soldiers, reservists and local security officers killed in fighting since the October 7, 2023, attack to 800.

The announcements came after the IDF said troops had killed over 1,300 terror operatives during an ongoing operation in the nearby Jabalia area of northern Gaza.

The operation being carried out by the 162nd Division was launched over a month ago.

More than 1,000 members of Hamas and other terror groups have also been detained, according to the military’s latest estimates released Tuesday, which added that some 100-200 operatives remain in the area.

The World Health Organization on Tuesday expressed grave concern for hospitals still partly operating in northern Gaza, with one hospital director describing the situation as an “extreme catastrophe.”

“We are very, very concerned, and it’s getting harder and harder to get the aid in. It’s getting harder and harder to get the specialist personnel in at a time when there is greater and greater need,” WHO spokeswoman Margaret Harris told journalists in Geneva.

She said the organization was “particularly concerned about Kamal Adwan Hospital” in Beit Lahiya, where Israeli forces launched an offensive against Hamas and other Palestinian terror groups last month.

The director of the Kamal Adwan Hospital in Beit Lahiya, Hossam Abu Safiyeh, told AFP by phone: “The situation in northern Gaza is that of an extreme catastrophe.

“We’re beginning to lose patients because we lack medical supplies and personnel,” he said.

A statement from COGAT, the Defense Ministry body responsible for civil affairs in the West Bank and Gaza, said Tuesday: “COGAT-led humanitarian efforts in the medical field continue.”

In its latest update on the situation in northern Gaza, the UN humanitarian office OCHA said Tuesday that “access to the Kamal Adwan, Al Awda and Indonesian hospitals remains severely restricted amid severe shortages of medical supplies, fuel and blood units.”

Israel has said it seeks to minimize civilian fatalities and stresses that Hamas uses Gaza’s civilians as human shields, fighting from civilian areas including homes, hospitals, schools, and mosques.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visited an Israeli military position in Gaza on Tuesday, vowing that Hamas would not rule in the Palestinian enclave after the war, seemingly rejecting efforts to reach a ceasefire with the terror group.

The premier also reiterated an offer to lavishly pay Gazans who turn over Israeli hostages, upping the reward to $5 million for each captive, after previously suggesting Israel would pay “several million” for their recovery.

The visit came amid dire warnings about the condition of the Israeli hostages who been held for some 13 months, since thousands of Hamas-led terrorists burst across the border into Israel on October 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people, seizing 251 hostages, and sparking the ongoing war in Gaza.

Later on Wednesday, the UN Security Council is slated to vote on a resolution demanding “an immediate, unconditional and permanent ceasefire” in Gaza along with the “immediate and unconditional release of all hostages.”

It is believed that 97 of the 251 hostages abducted by Hamas on October 7 remain in Gaza, including the bodies of at least 34 confirmed dead by the IDF.

In Gaza, the Hamas-run health ministry says more than 43,000 people in the Strip have been killed or are presumed dead in the fighting so far, though the toll cannot be verified and does not differentiate between civilians and fighters. Israel says it has killed some 18,000 combatants in battle.

Times of Israel staff contributed to this report.