Kushner and Mladenov to visit Israel next week to lean on Netanyahu to restore halt on strikes, adhere to humanitarian commitments, in bid to advance Hamas disarmament, source says.
Surveillance soldiers on the Gaza border were reportedly sounding the alarm on Thursday about armed terrorist activity inside the Gaza Strip, in what they said feels like a repeat of their unheeded warnings before the October 7, 2023, onslaught. Leading up to that Hamas-led invasion and massacre, the surveillance soldiers sent alerts about terrorists training for the attack, and were infamously ignored. Some of the surveillance soldiers, who are women, said sexism was a factor in their warnings being brushed aside.
Five female surveillance soldiers (tatzpitaniyot) from IDF Unit 414 were killed, and seven were taken captive when the Nahal Oz military base near the Gaza border was overrun. Noa Marciano was killed in captivity. Ori Megidish was rescued alive. The other five were eventually released during subsequent ceasefires. On Thursday, Channel 12 quoted a number of unnamed soldiers who described a feeling of deja vu. They reported watching armed terrorists operate and lay explosives along the Gaza Yellow Line that divides the territory between Israeli and Hamas control.
“We’re really seeing that they know we won’t fire on them. The Gazans aren’t idiots. In the end, they’re constantly testing us and seeing if we react or not. It’s just like before October 7,” one of the soldiers was quoted as having said. Another soldier told the network she feels “helpless” in the face of the terrorist activity she sees over the border. A different soldier said she and her comrades “feel a little unnecessary. If I know that, in any case, they won’t do anything with my identification [of terror activity], what’s the point of sitting eight hours a day and monitoring the area super-super-closely?”
A surveillance soldier quoted by the network went on to complain that combat soldiers stationed in Gaza are being used as “human shields.” “In the end, the soldiers are stationed a few hundred meters from these terrorists,” one of the surveillance soldiers said of the combat troops in Gaza. “We can’t just abandon them.” (Ed note: So whatever you do IDF, the US is coming to "lean" on you to make sure that you don't defend yourself against Hamas or make anyone mad. Remember when Jake Sullivan and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin used to show up in Israel and demand that the IDF stop defending itself against Hamas?) (Read More)
