IDF announces 2 soldiers killed, 2 wounded in blast at booby-trapped Rafah tunnel

Two IDF soldiers were killed and another two were wounded by a booby-trapped tunnel shaft in southern Gaza’s Rafah Saturday, the military announces.

The slain troops are named as Cpt. Noam Ravid, 23 from Sha’arei Tikva and Staff Sgt. Yaly Seror, 20, from Omer. Both served in the elite Yahalom combat engineering unit.

According to an initial IDF probe, the Yahalom soldiers, operating under the Golani Brigade, were scanning the entrance to a tunnel inside a building, when they were suddenly hit by an explosion.

One of the wounded soldiers is listed in serious condition while the other is moderately hurt.

In another incident yesterday, a reservist with the Jerusalem Brigade’s 7007th Battalion was seriously wounded in northern Gaza. The circumstances of his injury are still are under investigation, the military says.

Also yesterday, two soldiers of the 401st Armored Brigade’s 46th Battalion were wounded, one moderately and one lightly, by a blast in an army encampment in the area of Gaza City’s eastern Daraj and Tuffah neighborhoods.

According to an initial IDF investigation, the blast was apparently caused by a tank shell that prematurely detonated when it was being fired. Another possibility being looked into is that a mortar struck the area.