Military prevents publication of name of soldier or charges against him following his arrest in September 2020, while court hearings were also held behind closed doors; family rejects army claim that he took his own life
Judah Ari Gross is The Times of Israel s military correspondent.
In this May 19, 2021, photo, an Israeli artillery unit fires shells toward targets in Gaza. (AP Photo/Tsafrir Abayov)
Israeli Military Intelligence can not yet assess how long the ceasefire between Jerusalem and the Hamas terror group will last following this month’s 11-day battle between the two sides in the Gaza Strip.
Though the Israel Defense Forces firmly believes that it dealt a serious blow to Hamas’s military capabilities and undermined its core strategies by attacking its underground tunnel network, it acknowledges that the terror group still has thousands of rockets in its arsenals and could easily decide to use them again.
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Hamas military wing commander Muhammad Deif (courtesy)
The Israel Defense Forces attempted to kill the head of Hamas’s military wing, Muhammad Deif, at least twice over the past week and a half of fighting, but both times he escaped unscathed, according to the Israeli military.
This information was only permitted to be published on Tuesday night and was publicly confirmed by IDF Spokesperson Hidai Zilberman on Wednesday morning.
“I think by now he knows,” Zilberman quipped.
The details about the strikes on Deif, which took place sometime since last Monday, were not immediately known.
Throughout the IDF’s ongoing campaign in the Gaza Strip against Hamas, the military has said that one of its primary goals is killing top leaders of the terror group, who have largely gone into hiding to avoid IDF strikes. Deif in particular has been named as a potential target.