Since 2014, Israel has had citizens held hostage in Gaza, and with the return of Ran Gvili, the country has now brought home all of its people—underscoring its long-stated mission to return its civilians.

The post WATCH: All Israeli hostages returned from Gaza appeared first on World Israel News.

While Hamas readies an assault on Israel, the IDF prepares effective countermeasures.

Senior IDF officials warned that while Hamas is investing notable efforts in rebuilding its military capabilities and its network of terror tunnels, the IDF’s countermeasures will turn the underground passageways into a “deathtrap” for Hamas terrorists in the event of another war.

Speaking on Thursday, three years after Operation Protective Edge in the Gaza Strip, unnamed officials were quoted in Israel Hayom as saying that while the Israeli military significantly crippled Hamas’ grid of terror tunnels during the 2014 military campaign, the IDF is confident that it is now far better equipped and prepared to deal with the threat, having invested millions to develop and procure useful technologies and equipment, as well as build a counter-tunnel obstacle around the Gaza Strip.

The IDF destroyed 32 terror tunnels during Operation Protective Edge, and has since exposed several others. However, the threat still remains, and the IDF devoted extensive resources to devise a solution to the tunnel threat.

A February report in Israeli media said that Hamas has built at least 15 tunnels extending into Israel.

The terror organization employs over 1,000 residents of Gaza to dig its illegal cross-border tunnels and is spending hundreds of thousands of dollars monthly on wages. Each digger receives $300-400 a month.

Tens of Palestinian workers have been killed by collapsed tunnels. The IDF has warned the residents of Gaza that this occupation is hazardous.

IDF intelligence suggests that the majority of Hamas’ investment in the tunnels is actually focused on digging defense tunnels inside Gaza.

Over the past three years, the IDF has developed tactical plans and combat doctrines meant to deal with the tunnel threat.

Alongside their largely successful technological solutions, the IDF’s Engineering and Infantry Corps have developed various countermeasures and have undergone extensive tunnel warfare training.

The IDF has doubled the number of soldiers in the “Yahalom” unit, the elite commando unit of the IDF’s Combat Engineering Corps.

While combat soldiers in most units are trained in basic tunnel warfare, Yahalom specializes in discovering, clearing, and destroying terror tunnels.

Israel’s Air Force (IAF) also learned necessary lessons form Operation Protective Edge.

By: World Israel News Staff

The post IDF: Hamas tunnels will be ‘deathtrap’ for terrorists appeared first on World Israel News.

Hamas is accused of betraying the Red Crescent humanitarian organization in Gaza during the 2014 conflict with Israel by firing missiles from a field hospital.

Speaking at the Crown Prince’s Majilis (parliament) on Monday, United Arab Emirates (UAE) Red Crescent Secretary General, Mohammed Al Falahi, accused Hamas of knowingly endangering Red Crescent staff offering aid and medical assistance in Gaza in the 2014 conflict with Israel. The Red Crescent coordinated with Israeli forces via the Red Cross to avoid any targeting of their staff in the Strip.

While working at a Gaza field hospital set up by the UAE, the team was surprised to find Hamas terrorists firing homemade rockets from the hospital, knowing Israeli forces would return fire, which they did. “They always claim that the enemy (Israel) targets humanitarian envoys, but the betrayal came from them. This shows, their (Hamas) wicked intentions and how they sacrificed us.”

The accusation by the UAE Red Crescent supports Israel’s long held contention that throughout the 2014 conflict, Hamas launched rocket attacks from hospitals and schools, willfully endangering civilians and aid workers. Using civilians and aid workers as human shields is a war crime under international law.

As the team left the Strip, “after having raised the white flag, Hamas accused us of being spies, undercover foreign intelligence who were escaping,” said Al Falahi, adding this was an additional Hamas betrayal.

The team left Gaza via Egypt, where Al Falahi suggested Hamas informed Islamic extremist militias of their passage and advised them to make jihad against them. The team came under fire while stopping for supplies and also discovered that landmines were planted on the road they were meant to use.

“So, Muslims fighting Muslims who were giving aid to Muslims,”Al Falahi added.  “What hurts is that the betrayal came from our own people.”

By Gary Cohen / World Israel News

The post Hamas betrayed Red Crescent in Gaza, UAE asserts appeared first on World Israel News.

The Red Cross is urging Hamas to comply with international law and release five Israelis who went missing in Gaza.

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) on Thursday urged the Hamas terror group, which rules the Gaza Strip, to comply with its obligations under international humanitarian law and release five Israelis who went missing in Gaza and remain unaccounted for, including two soldiers presumed killed in action during Operation Protective Edge in 2014.

The families of IDF soldiers Hadar Goldin and Oron Shaul have been pressing the ICRC to intervene for the return of their sons’ bodies to Israel for proper burial. Hadar’s parents, Leah and Simcha, met earlier this week with ICRC representatives on the matter.

Shaul was killed in battle together with another six Golani soldiers in Shajaiya in 2014 when their armored personnel carrier was hit by an anti-tank rocket. His body was never recovered and is assumed to be held by Hamas.

Goldin was abducted by Hamas and killed during a battle with Hamas terrorists in Shajaiya. Two other IDF soldiers also died in the incident.

The fate of the other three Israeli nationals – Avera Mengistu, Hisham al-Sayed, and Jumaa Abu Ghanima – remains unknown.

Jacques de Maio, head of the ICRC delegation in Israel, stated Thursday that “missing persons, regardless of their status – fallen or captured soldiers during fighting, or civilians taken captive by an adverse party – are protected by humanitarian law. They and their families must be shown due regard under the law.”

“Persons captured alive must be accounted for and treated humanely. Human remains, too, must be handled with dignity, identified and returned to the families concerned,” de Maio said.

“These are among the most widely accepted rules of warfare. The ICRC has consistently reminded the Hamas authorities, at the highest level, of their legal and humanitarian obligations, and told them that intentionally withholding information about missing persons is acting in violation of humanitarian law,” de Maio added.

“The ICRC is in direct contact with the families concerned and remains committed to ascertaining the fate of all persons still unaccounted for,” he said.

World Jewish Congress (WJC) CEO and Executive Vice President Robert Singer met Thursday in Geneva with ICRC President Peter Maurer to deliver a petition signed by 11,000 people on behalf of the Goldin and Shaul families, calling on the ICRC to press Hamas for the release of the soldiers’ bodies.

“We have faith that the Red Cross will act honorably in accordance with its mandate and do everything possible to have the bodies of these soldiers repatriated,” Singer said after the meeting.

Israel and Hamas have negotiated on the issue. The terror group has rejected various Israeli offers.

By: World Israel News Staff

The post Red Cross presses Hamas to release captive Israelis, bodies of IDF soldiers appeared first on World Israel News.

Equating the IDF with ISIS, Warsi calls on the UK to prosecute UK citizens serving in the Israeli military.

Baroness Sayeeda Warsi, a former Conservative party cabinet member who resigned from her post in 2014 because the UK government did not condemn Israel’s counter-terrorism Operation Protective Edge, has called on the British government to prosecute citizens who volunteer to fight in the IDF.

Warsi, a British Muslim, said she was seeking to eliminate a loophole allowing Brits to serve in state armies like those of Israel or Pakistan, as well as in non-state militaries such as the Islamic State (ISIS) terror group.

“If you go out there and fight for any group, you will be subject to prosecution when you get back. If you go out and fight for Assad, I presume, under our law, that is okay. That can’t be right,” Warsi said in an interview with Middle East Eye.

According to Warsi, anyone who serves in the IDF should be treated as a foreign fighter, much like those who have gone to fight for ISIS in Syria and Iraq.

“The only reason we allow the loophole to exist is because of the IDF, because we are not brave enough to say if you hold British citizenship, you make a choice. You fight for our state only. That has to go out strong,” Warsi said, adding, “Let’s just shut down this loophole. If you don’t fight for Britain, you do not fight.”

‘Driven by Her Own Personal Agenda’

Stuart Polak, honorary president of the Conservative Friends of Israel, assailed Warsi’s equation between the IDF and ISIS.

“To equate the actions of the Israel Defense Force and non-state actors that can include vile terror groups such as Islamic State is misguided. This blasé attitude is both careless and shows a total lack of understanding of the only true democracy in the Middle East,” said Lord Polak.

Board of Deputies President Jonathan Arkush ridiculed her move. “Sayeeda Warsi lost all touch with reality when she flounced out of government over her Gaza issues and into well-earned obscurity,” he told Times of Israel.

“If she is really suggesting that a Briton who volunteers for the French Foreign Legion or serves in the armed forces of a close ally is a traitor, then no one can treat her seriously,” Arkush said.

Chairman of the Zionist Federation Paul Charney, who served as an IDF tank commander, called Warsi’s comparisons “irrational.”

“Baroness Warsi’s comments come dangerously close to comparisons between the defense forces of the democratic state of Israel and the extremist forces in Syria. This is a wildly irrational comparison and simply serves to demonize not only the Middle East’s, but arguably the world’s most moral army,” he stated.

“Baroness Warsi is driven by her own personal agenda, which is an anti-Israel one, and would sooner see Israel’s capability to defend itself limited than support the one true democracy in the region,” he added.

By: JNS.org and United with Israel Staff

The post Muslim British politician calls for prosecution of Brits in IDF appeared first on World Israel News.

While announcing his intentions to launch a new party and run for prime minister, Netanyahu’s former defense minister discounted any chances of uniting with Likud. 

Former Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon announced his intention to run for prime minister of Israel on Saturday.

“As I said when I resigned, I will run for the national leadership,” Ya’alon said at a cultural event in Tel Aviv on Saturday.

“I know how hard it is in politics, but I care about this country,” he continued. “I am now forming a new party.”

Ya’alon expressed at least some consideration to joining forces with an already existing party in the Knesset.

“I do not like the fracturing into small parties,” he said. “I am building my political power now, and when needed I will be happy to see unity.”

However, Ya’alon dismissed any possibility of uniting with Netanyahu’s Likud party, in which he had served as defense minister.

“Today, even Jabotinsky would not have been elected in their primaries,” he claimed, referring Ze’ev Jabotinsky, founder of Revisionist Zionism, on which the political philosophy of Likud is based.

Most recently, Ya’alon criticized the State Comptroller’s report that detailed failure on the part of Israel’s leadership, including Ya’alon and Netanyahu, to take preemptive steps before launching Operation Protective Edge in the summer of 2014 against the Gaza-based Hamas terrorist organization. Sixty-eight Israeli soldiers were killed in the operation.

By: Jonathan Benedek, World Israel News

The post Netanyahu’s former defense minister to run for premiership appeared first on World Israel News.

Terrorists fired a rocket at Israel, causing no casualties or damage. 

Palestinian terrorists fired a rocket at Israel’s civilian population from Gaza early Monday morning.

The rocket exploded in an open space, causing no casualties or damage. Sirens did not go off, as the explosion occurred far from a populated area.

The IDF has yet to respond to the attack.

This was the fourth incident of rocket fire in the past month.

Terrorists fired two rockets at the Eshkol Region, near Gaza, from the Sinai a week ago. The Islamic State (ISIS) affiliate in the Sinai took responsibility for the attack, which was thought to be in retaliation for an Israeli drone attack on five ISIS operatives.

At the beginning of the month, ISIS terrorists fired four rockets at the southern city of Eilat. An Iron Dome defense battery intercepted three of the projectiles, while the fourth exploded in an open area.

Earlier this month, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that Israel’s policy is to respond to even the most minimal of rocket fire emanating from the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip towards Israeli cities.

“Our policy is clear. Whoever fires on us, we will return fire, forcefully,” Netanyahu stated.

“There is no such thing as a drip-drip without a response,” he added. “Our policy is clear, and I hope it is also clear to Hamas.”

Since Operation Protective Edge in the summer of 2014, there have been multiple rocket attacks from Gaza.Over 45 rockets have exploded in Israeli territory.

By: Aryeh Savir, World Israel News

The post Terrorists fire rocket at Israel appeared first on World Israel News.

The Israel Air Force thwarted another attempt by Hamas to breach Israel’s air space.

An Israeli Air Force (IAF) F-16 fighter plane shot down a Hamas-flown Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) over the Gaza Strip on Thursday.

The drone, which crashed into the sea after being shot down, did not enter Israeli airspace at any time, the IDF said in a statement.

“The IDF will not tolerate any breach of [Israel’s] airspace and will act with determination against any attempt to do so,” the IDF stated.

The terror organization, which rules the Gaza Strip, has attempted to penetrate Israeli airspace in the past with drones, most recently in September.

In June 2015, a Hamas drone crashed inside Israel.

In July 2014, a UAV flying from Gaza was shot down over Ashdod by a Patriot missile battery during Operation Protective Edge.

In February 2016, security inspectors and Israeli security forces prevented an attempt to smuggle several drones into Gaza, suspected to have been intended for Hamas’ use.

A close examination of cargo marked as toys revealed that several drones, of different models and sizes and equipped with hi-tech cameras, were hidden underneath.

Hamas has been working for over a decade to develop aircraft that could be used for surveillance or attack missions.

Mohammed Al-Zawari, an aviation engineer working for Hamas, was shot dead in December in the Tunisian city of Sfax. Hamas confirmed that Zawari was a member of their military wing and a pioneer in their drone program.

Israel’s Mossad espionage agency has unofficially been implicated in the hit, while Hamas has directly blamed Israel and threatened to retaliate.

By: Aryeh Savir, World Israel News

The post Israel shoots down Hamas drone appeared first on World Israel News.

The Goldins reached out to Ambassador Haley for help in bringing their slain son for burial in Israel. 

Leah and Dr. Simha Goldin, the parents of IDF solider Lt. Hadar Goldin who was killed during Operation Protective Edge and whose body is held by the Hamas terror organization, met on Wednesday with US Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley.

Goldin was killed and kidnapped by Hamas terrorists in the Gaza Strip during a UN sponsored ceasefire in August 2014, towards the end of the counter-terror campaign.

During their meeting, the Goldin family requested that Haley assist in their efforts to return Hadar and IDF Sgt. Oron Shaul, whose body is also held by Hamas, for burial in Israel.

“We thank Ambassador Haley for meeting with the Goldin family,” said Israel’s Ambassador to the UN Danny Danon.

“Hadar was killed and kidnapped by despicable terrorists during a UN sponsored ceasefire and we won’t rest until this organization ensures his and Oron’s return for proper burial in Israel,” Danon continued.

“We appreciate Ambassador Haley’s willingness to assist us in the return of our sons and we hope that these efforts bear fruit as soon as possible,” added Leah and Simha Goldin.

Goldin was abducted by Hamas and killed during a battle with Hamas terrorists in Shajaiya. Two other IDF soldiers also died in the incident

Shaul died in battle together with another six Golani soldiers in Shajaiya when their armored personnel carrier was hit by an anti-tank rocket. His body was never recovered and is assumed to be held by Hamas.

Avra Mangisto and Hisham Al-Sayed are two Israeli civilians believed to be held by Hamas after entering the Strip on their own.

Hamas recently claimed that it turned down an Israeli offer for a prisoner swap in exchange for two Israeli citizens and the remains of two IDF soldiers.

By: Aryeh Savir, World Israel News

The post US Ambassador to UN meets with parents of IDF soldier whose body is held by Hamas appeared first on World Israel News.

Another two Palestinians have died while working in Hamas tunnels.

At least two Palestinians were killed in tunnels in the Gaza Strip on Monday.

The Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades, Hamas’ military wing, announced that a member of the terror group, Ahmad Asaad Shihada al-Barim, 22, was killed when a “resistance tunnel” collapsed.

While Hamas did not specify where the tunnel was located, the use of the term “resistance tunnel” generally indicates the territory between Gaza and Israel, Palestinian Ma’an news agency reported.

Separately, the Palestinian Information Center (PIC) said on Monday that a worker was killed when Egyptian military forces flooded a smuggling tunnel between Gaza and the Sinai Peninsula. PIC identified the victim as Mumin Abu Hamid.

Tens of Palestinian workers have been killed by collapsed tunnels. The IDF had warned the residents of Gaza that this occupation is hazardous.

The terror organization is employing over 1,000 residents of Gaza in the digging of its cross-border tunnels and is spending hundreds of thousands of dollars monthly in wages. Each digger receives $300-400 a month.

Hamas has built a sophisticated network of tunnels in order to carry out terror attacks against Israeli civilians and soldiers and to smuggle goods and weapons in and out of Gaza through the Sinai Peninsula.

The IDF destroyed most of the tunnels during Operation Protective Edge in the summer of 2014, but Hamas has since been working vigorously to rebuild the network. The IDF has exposed several of them.

The Institute for Palestine Studies reported in 2012 that Hamas authorities had counted 160 deaths inside the tunnels since the Israeli blockade began in 2007, and in August 2014, Al-Jazeera reported that figure to be as high as 400.

By: Aryeh Savir, World Israel News

The post Another 2 Palestinians killed in tunnel collapses in Gaza appeared first on World Israel News.

Israel made an offer to facilitate the return of the bodies of two soldiers killed during Israel’s 2014 war with Hamas and two civilians who crossed into Gaza, but Hamas has rejected the offer.

Hamas claimed Wednesday that it had again turned down an Israeli offer for a prisoner swap in exchange for two Israeli citizens and the remains of two IDF soldiers held by Hamas.

According to a report by Al-Jezeera, Hamas said they turned down the Israeli offer because it did not meet even their minimal demands.

Earlier this week, a Hamas source was quoted as saying that the terror group rejected an Israeli proposal to swap one of the Israelis held in Gaza for a Hamas prisoner, a brother of a senior Hamas official jailed in Israel.

Hamas is reportedly seeking a comprehensive deal and not a partial exchange. Such a comprehensive release of prisoners would play well for their propaganda purposes.

Avra Mangisto and Hisham Al-Sayed are two Israeli civilians believed to be held by Hamas after entering the Strip on their own.

In addition, the remains of Hadar Goldin and Oron Shaul, two IDF soldiers killed in Operation Protective Edge in the summer of 2014, are believed to be held by the terror group.

Goldin was abducted by Hamas and killed during a battle with Hamas terrorists in Shajaiya. Two other IDF soldiers also died in the incident

Shaul died in battle together with another six Golani soldiers in Shajaiya when their armored personnel carrier was hit by an anti-tank rocket. His body was never recovered and is assumed to be held by Hamas.

Hamas has claimed in the past that Israel has advanced offers for a prisoner swap, which they have turned down.

In September, the prime minister’s coordinator for POWs and MIAs, Colonel (RES.) Lior Lotan, told the Herzliya Conference that Israel made two parallel offers through several channels to facilitate the return of the soldiers’ bodies and the civilians, but Hamas rejected both.

Zahava Shaul, mother of Oron Shaul, said in response to the report of that she expects Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Israel’s government to do their utmost to bring her son home.

The Goldin family also stated that it was unsatisfied with the government’s efforts to return their son’s remains for burial in Israel.

By: Aryeh Savir, World Israel News

The post Hamas: We turned down an Israeli prisoner-exchange offer appeared first on World Israel News.

Another war with Hamas is inevitable, Bennett says, adding that Israel must aim to destroy the terror regime completely.

Education Minister Naftali Bennett said Tuesday that another round of fighting with Hamas “is a question of when, not ‘if,’” adding that Israel must aim in the coming conflict to remove the terror group from power once and for all.

Speaking at a memorial service for Ella Abukasis, a 17-year-old girl who died when she was hit by a Kassam rocket from Gaza in 2005 as she shielded her 10-year-old brother from the attack, Bennett said that Israelis must be free to walk the streets without fear of missile attacks.

“This time we must score a definitive victory and not be satisfied with a tie that leaves Hamas able to rearm and plan the next round at its leisure,” Bennett stated. “Only by completely defeating the enemy can we put an end to the neverending merry-go-round of attacks and ceasefires.”

Earlier Tuesday, Housing Minister Yoav Gallant, a decorated former general, said there was a high probability of another round of fighting with Hamas in the spring or early summer.

Both Hamas and the IDF have said that they do not want Monday’s rocket attack from Gaza and the IDF’s response to presage an escalation of hostilities, but should that occur, the conflict would take place under vastly different circumstances than the 2009 Operation Cast Lead, the 2012 Operation Pillar of Defense and the 2014 Operation Protective Edge.

Until now Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu resisted calls to topple Hamas, out of concern for the response of the international community as well as IDF intelligence estimates that say that Hamas, if defeated, will likely be replaced by even more radical and militant Salafi groups. In all three major conflicts with Hamas, Netanyahu’s stated goal has been “to restore quiet to Israeli citizens.”

Senior members of the governing coalition, including Education Minister Naftali Bennett and Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman, have called openly and repeatedly for regime change in Gaza.

The IDF high command will also have something to say about a large-scale operation aimed at toppling Hamas in Gaza. They will likely remind Netanyahu that any major invasion of Gaza without a clearly thought-out and agreed-upon plan for the day after, which includes a viable exit strategy, would likely end up as a quagmire.

By: Andrew Friedman/TPS

The post Bennett: Next war with Hamas only a matter of time appeared first on World Israel News.

Israeli security forces succeeded in thwarting another attempt to smuggle weaponry to Palestinian terrorists.

Israeli security forces have exposed a network of Palestinian smugglers engaged in moving terror equipment from the PA-administered territories in Judea and Samaria to the Gaza Strip via the Kerem Shalom crossing, the Shin Bet (Israel’s security Agency) stated Monday.

The network is suspected of smuggling hundreds of cameras, some of which were designated for Hamas elements in the Gaza Strip. The equipment smuggled was of dual use and therefore not completely banned.

Hamas uses the cameras for surveillance and reconnaissance in preparation for a pending attack on Israel.

In December 2016, the Shin Bet arrested two suspects, both merchants – Nofal Abu Siriya from the Gaza Strip and Nader Massalma from the PA area.

The Shin Bet learned during its investigation that in 2016, Abu Siriya, on several occasions, smuggled goods defined as dual use, which require a special permit for entering Gaza.

The ring smuggled the merchandise to Gaza for Ahmed Abu Nafar and Zaher Bitar, local businessmen who deal in security cameras. The goods included hundreds of cameras, model airplanes and communications cables.

The smuggled merchandise was hidden in a consignment of various electronic goods, such as televisions, washing machines and refrigerators.

The Shin Bet also discovered that in November 2016, Massalma assisted Abu Siriya in smuggling hundreds of cameras inside washing machines that were transported from the PA territories to Gaza.

Several members of the network were aware that the smuggled cameras were designated for members of the Hamas military wing, the Shin Bet said.

The incident is “additional testimony to Gaza Strip-based merchants’ abuse of the permits given [to] them for goods designated for the civilian population in order to smuggle dual-use equipment for the benefit – inter alia – of terrorist elements in the Gaza Strip,” the Shin Bet pointed out.

The Shin Bet stressed that the smuggling method “underscores the efforts undertaken by Hamas, via its collaborators, in order to build up its strength and cynically exploit the commercial permits given by Israel for the benefit of the civilian population in the Gaza Strip.”

“The security establishment views the foregoing with utmost gravity and will continue to locate and foil attempts to smuggle equipment, goods and dual-use materials to the Gaza Strip, and which are liable to assist Hamas and other terrorist organizations to build up their strength. Those involved – in Israel, Judea and Samaria, and the Gaza Strip – will be dealt with to the fullest extent of the law,” the Shin Bet vowed.

The State Attorney’s Office on Monday filed indictments against Abu Siriya and Massalma in the Be’er Sheva Magistrates Court.

Israel’s combined security agencies have been successful in thwarting multiple attempts to smuggle weapons and materials used for warfare against Israel, mostly into Gaza, almost on a daily basis. Many of these smuggling operations have employed imaginative methods, including by sea and via Israel’s postal service.

Since 2014, when Israel decimated Hamas’ terror infrastructure during Operation Protective Edge, Hamas has been working relentlessly to rehabilitate its networks and replenish its weapons stockpiles, and has attempted to smuggle everything from gun scopes to entire trucks.

By: Aryeh Savir, World Israel News

The post Israeli forces arrest Palestinian smuggling network appeared first on World Israel News.

After a prolonged and painful two-year struggle, Major Hagai Ben Ari succumbed to wounds he sustained during Operation Protective Edge. 

IDF Major Hagai Ben Ari, who sustained a critical head injury during Operation Protective Edge in Gaza in the summer of 2014, died of his wounds on Tuesday, almost two and a half years after a Hamas sniper shot him.

Hagai Ben Ari, 31, the father of three children, was serving as commander of training for the Maglan Special Forces unit when the counter-terror operation against Hamas commenced. At the time, he was on leave but chose to join his men and lead them into Gaza.

He never regained consciousness.

Ben Ari had been in line to become the next commander of the elite Paratrooper’s Reconnaissance Unit, and was symbolically promoted to the post after his injury.

He was the 68th Israeli soldier to fall in the line of duty while fighting to protect Israeli civilians from Hamas terrorism during Operation Protective Edge. A total of 74 Israelis died during that war.

Speaking to IDF Radio, Ben Ari’s brother Noam said that “while they are experiencing great pain, there is a sense that he [Hagai] has been redeemed from his suffering. His injury was so severe; these were two and half years during which he fought for his life. Yesterday, at the end of the day, it really ended.”

He will be buried in his hometown of Nov, a religious community in the Golan Heights.

By: Aryeh Savir, World Israel News

The post After two-year struggle, IDF officer dies of wounds sustained in Gaza War appeared first on World Israel News.

Another four Palestinians have died while digging tunnels for the Hamas terror organization.  

Four Palestinians were killed in a smuggling tunnel over the weekend after it was flooded by the Egyptian army.

Three of the bodies were recovered by emergency personnel after they went missing in a tunnel that runs between Gaza and Egypt.

Search efforts were ongoing Sunday for a fourth person, who is still missing.

The Al-Aqsa Radio, run by the Hamas terror group, reported that the tunnel caved in after the Egyptian military flooded it with water. There was no comment from the Egyptian army.

The Egyptian army periodically floods smuggling tunnels running into the Sinai Peninsula, which are used to smuggle terrorists and weapons in and out of Gaza.

Tens of Palestinians have been killed by collapsed tunnels while working in them.

The IDF has warned the residents of Gaza that this occupation is hazardous.

Egyptian operations against the tunnels and possible Israeli involvement are believed to be causes for the tunnel collapses.

Hamas employs over 1,000 residents of Gaza to dig its cross-border tunnels and is spending hundreds of thousands of dollars monthly in wages. Each digger receives $300-400 a month.

Hamas has also built a sophisticated network of tunnels that it has used to penetrate Israel in order to carry out terrorist attacks against civilians and soldiers and to smuggle goods and weapons in and out of Gaza through the Sinai Peninsula.

The IDF destroyed most of the tunnels during Operation Protective Edge in the summer of 2014, but Hamas has since been working vigorously to rebuild the network. The IDF has exposed several of them.

By: World Israel News Staff
AP contributed to this report

The post 4 Palestinians killed in flooded Hamas tunnel appeared first on World Israel News.

Israel has warned Gaza’s civilians to avoid working for Hamas and stop digging tunnels for the terror organization, hinting that not all tunnel collapses are accidents.

The IDF’s Coordination of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT), the unit responsible for implementing government policy in Judea and Samaria and vis-à-vis the Gaza Strip, is urging the citizens of Gaza to cease their digging of terror tunnels in Hamas’ service.

In a post published on COGAT’s Facebook page in Arabic on Wednesday, the unit noting that over 30 Palestinians were killed in the past two years during activities connected with digging tunnels.

“Anyone nearing the tunnels, digging or aiding their construction is sealing their fate,” COGAT warned.

The post also hinted to the fact that not all fatal tunnel collapses were “work accidents.”

Egyptian operations against the tunnels and possible Israeli involvement are believed to be causes for the tunnel collapses.

Just this week, two Palestinians were killed in Gaza when the terror tunnels they were working in collapsed.

The Hamas terror organization employs over 1,000 residents of Gaza to dig its cross-border tunnels, and is spending hundreds of thousands of dollars monthly in wages. Each digger receives $300-400 a month.

Hamas has built a sophisticated network of tunnels that it has used to penetrate Israel to carry out terrorist attacks against civilians and soldiers and smuggle goods and weapons in and out of Gaza through the Sinai Peninsula.

The IDF destroyed most of the tunnels during Operation Protective Edge in the summer of 2014, but Hamas has since been working vigorously to rebuild the network, and the IDF has exposed several of them.

By: World Israel News Staff

The post IDF warns Gazans to stop digging tunnels for Hamas appeared first on World Israel News.