Parents of Israeli soldiers in anxious wait as Gaza war drags on, losses mount
- Relatives of Israeli troops operating in Gaza have been left fearing for their loved ones and contemplating the war’s costs
David, a 61-year-old Israeli, has been on edge ever since his soldier son was deployed to Gaza, where the war sparked by Hamas’ October 7 attack shows little sign of abating.
“As a father, I’m always nervous,” David said at the family’s northern Israel home, just after his son Yonatan, 22, left to join his army unit in Rafah, the focus of recent fighting in the southern Gaza Strip.
The family has asked to use first names only for safety reasons.
David and other relatives of troops in Gaza have been left fearing for their loved ones and contemplating the war’s costs. For some, it is too much.
Yonatan has been among the tens of thousands of Israeli soldiers and reservists sent to Gaza in Israel’s withering military campaign, which the health ministry in the Hamas-run territory says has killed 37,337 people, mostly civilians.
The October 7 attack on southern Israel resulted in the deaths of 1,194 people, also mostly civilians, according to an Agence France-Presse tally based on Israeli figures.