Twenty-one-year-old St.-Sgt. Shoham Menahem, 20-year-old Sgt. Shlomo Yakir Shrem, and 19-year-old Sgt. Yuliy Faktor were killed while fighting in northern Gaza, the IDF announced on Monday.
Menahem was from moshav Yardena, Shrem was from Efrat, and Faktor was from Rishon Lezion.
All three soldiers served in the 401st Brigade of the Armored Corps.
Further, an officer from the same brigade was severely wounded in the incident.
The three soldiers were killed while inside their tank during a brigade mission in Jabalya in the northern Gaza Strip aimed at defeating a local Hamas battalion and destroying terror infrastructure, according to Army Radio. The explosion occurred at around noon.
Cause of the explosion
The initial assessment by the IDF was that an anti-tank missile caused the explosion, Army Radio said. But, as of Monday evening, the IDF believes there is a high likelihood that it was an operational accident and that one of the tank's shells exploded inside. It is unclear what caused the shell to explode.
The IDF continues to investigate the circumstances of the explosion.
According to the IDF's tally, the death of Staff-Sergeant Shoham, Sergeant Shlomo, and Sergeant Yuliy Faktor raises the total number of soldiers killed on or since October 7 of last year to 893.
Some 446 of them were killed since the start of the military’s ground operations in the Gaza Strip on October 27.
This is a developing story.