War on Gaza to lead to army's demise: Israeli Reserve General Brik
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Earlier on Thursday, Knesset member Amit Levy said that "all 24 Hamas brigades are present [in Gaza] and not a single one of them has been destroyed."
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Israeli soldiers drive a tank at a staging ground near the separation line with the Gaza Strip, in southern occupied Palestine, Sunday, May 5, 2024. (AP Photo/Tsafrir Abayov)
Major General in the Israeli Reserve Army Yitzhak Brik on Thursday said that the current war unfolding in Gaza is a "war of attrition" and warned that its prolongation "will lead to the collapse of the army and economy in Israel."
Speaking to Israeli broadcaster Channel 13, Brik said that "the Israeli army needs immediate rehabilitation" and there is an urgent need to increase the number of ground forces.
Brik acknowledged the army's failure in defeating the Resistance, noting that the Strip "represents one [front] out of six," and the war against it "does not involve launching thousands of rockets daily (as is the case of other war scenarios with other fronts, such as Lebanon and Iran)."
Addressing the reasons that would lead to the collapse of "the army" and the Israeli economy in the event of the war's prolongation, Brik warned of "the absence of soldiers (to replace those currently on the ground), the absence of workers amid international isolation facing Israel."
Read more: 223 days of Israeli aggression: 35,272 killed, 79,205 injured in Gaza
Earlier on Thursday, Knesset member Amit Levy said that "all 24 Hamas brigades are present [in Gaza] and not a single one of them has been destroyed."
In addition to the Resistance's resilience, the Islamic Jihad movement remains present, "they lied to us that it had been eliminated," Levy told Channel 14.
These statements come amid increasing doubts about the objectives of the ongoing Israeli war on Gaza, as Israeli troops return to old battlefields in the Strip, according to Reuters.
In the eighth month of the war, the Israeli army returned to fighting in areas in the northern Gaza Strip, where Israeli soldiers were among the dead and injured after the regime claimed that they had been "cleared."
According to Reuters, this points out growing questions about the regime's goal of eliminating Hamas and concerns over the absence of a clear post-war plan for Gaza.
Read more: Egypt rejects Israeli proposal for joint coordination to reopen Rafah
Earlier today, the Israeli army announced that five Israeli troops from the 35th Paratroopers Brigade's 202nd Battalion were killed in Gaza's Jabalia refugee camp, while another eight were wounded.
The troops, which include one officer, were killed after the Palestinian Resistance detonated explosives that were previously laid in a building in Jabalia.
Israeli news website Ynet reported that fighters from the 82nd Armored Battalion spotted a gun barrel protruding from a building in the refugee camp and targeted the building with two shells. The website said that the crew of the Merkava tank had no knowledge of the fact that the building was appropriated by the 202nd Battalion and turned into a command post.
Hence, Israeli media outlets claim that the shelling of the building killed five troops and injured another three by friendly fire.
