The dead are First Sergeants Nave Yair Asulin, Ofir Eliyahu, Orr Katz, and Gary Lalhruaikima Zolat of the Kfir Brigade.
By Batya Jerenberg, World Israel News
Four IDF soldiers of the Kfir Brigade’s Shimshon Brigade were killed in battle in the northern Gaza Strip, the IDF announced Tuesday.
First Sergeants Nave Yair Asulin (21) of Carmit, Ofir Eliyahu (20) of Holon, Orr Katz (20) of Maaleh Adumim, and Gary Lalhruaikima Zolat (21) of Afula, died in an explosion in Jabalya while fighting Hamas terrorists.
The initial army investigation of the incident is pointing to their being hit by an anti-tank missile fired by a Hamas terrorist into the building they had just entered.
Asulin went to live in the Negev community of Carmit six years ago together with his parents and two brothers. According to his cousin Tair Yifrach’s testimonial to Ynet, he had always wanted to become a combat soldier, “out of great love of the country.”
Asulin “only wanted to add good to the world,” she said, adding that after his IDF service, he “dreamed of becoming an architect.”
Eliyahu’s mother, Nadia, told the news site that her son had been injured, tearing his knee, during basic training in 2022 and had been determined to return to his combat unit.
His father, Ami, said that “Ofir and his friends only wanted to fight for the country…. It’s been a hard year. With every knock on the door we ran [to it] like madmen, and this time it happened, the awful knock came to us.”
Eliyahu was an avid fan of the Hapoel Holon basketball team, and was planning to go on a post-service trip to the United States with his army buddies.
Katz had twice already received a certificate of excellence from the IDF during his service. He served in the north, then Hebron, and only ten days ago entered Gaza for the first time, his sister-in-law, Noy, told Ynet.
His first name, Orr, means “light” in Hebrew, and she said that Katz “was exactly like his name, wherever he was, people would feel the light.”
He “always helped anyone who asked,” she said, and the family was finding it impossible to internalize his loss.
Zolat was a member of Bnei Menashe community, a group of crypto-Jews in India which claims descent from the ancient tribe of Manasseh. Most of the community converted to Judaism in coordination with Israel’s Chief Rabbinate, but it is only being allowed to immigrate to Israel piecemeal.
He came to Afula from Sderot with his family in 2014. His father, Dagan, described him as a person who “loved his family and army friends, and to take care of animals. He wanted to be a combat soldier.”
The local HaEmek Mynet site reported that he “loved his army service and protecting the State and the Jewish people.”
Zolat is survived by his parents and three siblings.
A fifth soldier, Maj. (res.) Itamar Levin Fridman, 34, a member of the elite anti-terror the LOTAR Eilat unit, was killed Monday in a separate battle in Jabalya, also by an anti-tank missile.
The IDF entered the Gazan town in October for the fourth time since the beginning of the war last year to clear it out once again of Hamas forces.
It was labelled the “most significant center of gravity” for the terrorist organization in the northern part of the Strip and the army is determined to break it once and for all.
To do so, the army set up humanitarian corridors to enable the civilian residents to leave, which some 60,000 did despite the attempts of Hamas to force them to stay so they could be used as human shields.
The death toll from the ground invasion of Gaza now stands at 375 IDF soldiers.