JERUSALEM: Israel’s military said four soldiers were injured Wednesday in a clash with Palestinian militants in the southern Gaza Strip, where a ceasefire has largely halted fighting between Israel and Hamas.
The US-brokered ceasefire which came into effect on October 10 remains fragile, with both sides accusing each other of violating the terms.
The Israeli military said that during an operation in the area of eastern Rafah on Wednesday, soldiers encountered several militants “who emerged from an underground terrorist infrastructure.”
“During the encounter, an (Israeli) combat soldier was severely injured, two additional combat soldiers and a non-commissioned officer were moderately injured,” the military said in a statement.
It added that the soldiers were evacuated to hospital for medical treatment, and their families had been notified.
The office of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the Israeli premier sent his “wishes for a speedy recovery to our heroic soldiers,” accusing Hamas of violating the ceasefire agreement.
A security source in Gaza told AFP that at around 4pm local time (1400 GMT), “very heavy artillery shelling took place from occupation vehicles east of Rafah city, along with heavy gunfire from warplanes.”
The source added that an Israeli helicopter had also landed in the area.
The military said Sunday that it had killed more than 40 militants over the past week in operations targeting tunnels near Rafah, where dozens of Hamas fighters are holed up beneath areas controlled by the Israeli military.
Multiple sources told AFP last week that negotiations were underway regarding the fate of the fighters still in south Gaza’s tunnel network.
On Thursday, a prominent Hamas member in Gaza told AFP that the group estimated their number to be between 60 and 80.
The Gaza war was sparked by Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack on Israel, which resulted in the deaths of 1,221 people.
Israel’s retaliatory assault on Gaza has killed at least 70,117 people, according to figures from the territory’s health ministry that the United Nations considers reliable.
The ministry says since the ceasefire came into effect, 360 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli fire. Israel’s military has reported three soldiers killed during the same period.