Father of slain soldier says son died in vain

The father of slain IDF soldier Dor Dery, 18. who was killed in the infiltration incident in Nahal Oz, denounces the IDF for deploying his son there without the appropriate combat training and experience.

“I spoke with the heads of the Central Command and Southern Command, I told them my son was not trained enough, and he didn’t need to go there. Not him, not his friend. Someone made a mistake here along the way, a serious snafu,” David Dery tells Channel 2.

Dor, along with four other soldiers, were killed on July 28 when terrorists infiltrated Israel from Gaza through a tunnel. The Jerusalem resident, who was drafted eight months earlier, was still in the midst of a squad commander course.

“These are children. What do you expect from a child,” Dery adds. “The bottom line — my son fell in vain.”

Dery says in retrospect, he’s thankful that his son was killed, and that his body was not abducted, as the Hamas operatives had intended.

The parents of Sgt. Daniel Kedmi, 18, who was killed in the same incident, chime in that in the aftermath of the attack, remarks by Southern Command head Sami Turgeman seemed to cast blame on the soldiers for not responding appropriately.

“Before even seeing the investigation [results], he made us feel that they were sleeping and did nothing,” Tami Kedmi says. Her husband, Boaz adds: “It’s painful, the statement he made, before checking and drawing conclusions. We didn’t receive any statements, no one told us what happened there.”

In response, the IDF says that once the operation concludes, investigations will be launched and the results will be presented to the victims’ families.

Turgeman “said the incident should have ended differently, just like any incident in which soldiers are killed,” the army says. “His remarks did not cast aspersions on the troops’ performance, but rather explained that in any attack, we must aspire to have the upper hand.”

It stresses that the troops in the squadron course “were trained for the position, as they are the best troops from their units selected for the course, and were prepared for their mission.”