JERUSALEM
Five Israeli troops were killed in combat in the Gaza Strip, the Israeli army said on Monday.
It added that the new fatalities bring to 48 the number of Israeli troops killed in Gaza since the beginning of Israel's war on the Palestinian enclave on July 7.
The army said in a statement that the five troops were killed in combat throughout Monday.
It said a sergeant from Jerusalem was killed in battles northern Gaza, while four more troops were killed by a mortar on the border of the Gaza Strip.
Qassam Brigades, the military arm of the Gaza-based Palestinian resistance movement Hamas, says it has killed a total of 103 Israeli troops so far and captured others.
Since July 7, Israel has pounded the Gaza Strip with fierce aerial bombardments with the ostensible aim of halting rocket fire from the strip, leaving at least 1058 Palestinians dead and more than 6258 others injured.
Gaza-based resistance factions, meanwhile, have continued to fire rocket at Israeli cities in response to relentless Israeli bombardments.
Israel's military operation, dubbed operation "Protective Edge," is the self-proclaimed Jewish state's third major offensive against the densely-populate Gaza Strip – which is home to some 1.8 million Palestinians – within the last six years.
In 2008/9, over 1500 Palestinians were killed in Israel's three-week-long operation "Cast Lead."
By Abdel-Raouf Arnaout
www.aa.com.tr/en
