Six comrades of soldier who died were also dehydrated during drill – report

At least six troops who were training with a soldier who died during an exercise this week in the midst of a heat wave also suffered dehydration and some required medical attention, according to a report Tuesday.

Cpl. Hillel Nehemiah Ofan’s parents expressed hope that a military investigation into the training exercise that left him dead early Monday will be in-depth and focus on a “comprehensive fix” rather than on finding a scapegoat on whom to throw the blame.

Ofan, 20, who served in the elite Yahalom combat engineering unit, collapsed during an exercise in which soldiers were made to crawl on the ground for some 300 meters overnight. The incident occurred in a forest near the central city of Elad, the military said, with a preliminary investigation blaming heatstroke and dehydration. There have been claims that it took 30 minutes until commanders noticed Ofan had collapsed and started to give him medical treatment.

Though Ofan died between 4 and 5 a.m., temperatures in the area had remained elevated even during the night. Official meteorological data shows that soldiers would have been operating in 29°C (84°F) heat, with humidity near 80 percent.

According to other soldiers in the unit who spoke to Channel 12 news, several troops were exhausted from the get-go, after a day in which the air conditioner in their tent had been on the fritz.

“[Ofan] was not the only one to get dehydrated out there, there were another six, some of whom fainted and required medical attention,” one soldier was quoted telling the station.

“All day the air conditioning wasn’t working. We felt dehydrated even before the exercise started, we couldn’t get any rest. We’re really out of sorts, feeling like we can’t trust the system,” the unnamed soldier said.

Temperatures have been high across the country since Saturday, and though the heat wave has let up slightly since Monday, temperatures are still above normal.

Following the deadly incident, the commander of the IDF’s Ground Forces, Maj. Gen. Tamir Yadai, ordered a halt to all training exercises until Wednesday at 5 a.m.

Yadai later ordered the establishment of a panel of experts to investigate the circumstances of the incident, appointing Col. Elad Efrati, the commander of the 679th “Yiftah” Armoured Reserve Brigade, to lead the probe.

At Ofan’s funeral late Tuesday, the commander of his unit vowed that the incident “will continue to be probed in a professional manner.”

Ofan’s father Boaz told reporters the family was currently dealing more with its grief than with the investigation, but he expressed hope that “they will fix what needs fixing and won’t probe in order to throw the blame on the low-ranking people — that’s the easiest and it won’t fix anything.”

He said a “comprehensive fix” was needed.

Ofan, from the West Bank settlement of Karmei Tzur, was posthumously promoted from the rank of private to corporal.

A Military Police probe was opened into the incident. “At the end of the investigation, the findings will be forwarded to the Military Prosecutor’s Office for evaluation,” the IDF said.

Emanuel Fabian contributed to this report.