IDF paratrooper officer killed and 6 wounded in airstrike malfunction in Khan Younis

The soldier who was killed was named Lieutenant Shahar Ben-Nun, 21, from Petah Tikva, who was an officer in the Paratroopers Reconnaissance Unit.

By Vered Weiss, World Israel News

An IDF officer in the paratrooper unit was killed, and others were injured during an Israeli airstrike malfunction in Khan Younis on Monday.

The soldier who was killed was named Lieutenant Shahar Ben-Nun, 21, from Petah Tikva, who was an officer in the Paratroopers Reconnaissance Unit.

Three soldiers sustained moderate injuries and three others were lightly wounded.

The soldiers were conducting a raid on the Hamed neighborhood in the western part of Khan Younis when an F-15 missile exploded in the wrong place.

At 6:30 am on Monday, fighter jets were striking terror targets when an F-15 missile landed on the wrong target and fell on a multi-story building where the soldiers were stationed.

When the missile struck the upper floors, soldiers in the nearby building were affected by the explosion.

According to the investigation, the area where the missile landed was 300 meters away from the intended target.

The IAF said that this kind of malfunction was not expected and that tens of thousands of munitions had been fired without such an error.

The most recent casualty brings the total number of IDF casualties since October 7th at 694, with 333 since the beginning of the ground operation in Gaza.

Also on Monday, An IDF soldier seriously injured in a drone attack on northern Israel succumbed to his injuries.

Six people were injured, one of them critically, when five suicide drones operated by Hezbollah terrorists in southern Lebanon crossed into Israeli airspace Monday morning, with one of the unmanned aircraft slamming into Moshav Ya’ara in Western Galilee.

One building was struck in the drone attack, and a fire sparked by the exploding unmanned aircraft. In addition, ten rockets were fired by Hezbollah terrorists at northern Israel.

Later on Monday, the IDF announced that the soldier who had been critically injured in the attack had died.

He was identified as 45-year-old Chief Warrant Officer Mahmood Amaria, a resident of Ibtin, a Bedouin town southeast of Haifa in northern Israel.

Amaria was a tracker in the IDF’s 300th “Baram” Regional Brigade.