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Video Shows IDF Soldiers In Close-Quarters Combat With Hamas Fighters

Screen Shot Of IDF Soldiers V. Hamas in Khan Yunis

[Screenshot/Public/Twitter/@JoeTruzman]

Ilan Hulkower Contributor
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A video captured the intensity of close-quarters combat Tuesday within the Gaza Strip between Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) and Hamas fighters.

The video, posted on Twitter by Joe Truzman, captured moments of a heated battle within a building in Khan Yunis, a city within the Gaza Strip, in which IDF paratroopers eventually emerged victorious. (RELATED: Wild Video Shows IDF Soldier Getting Blasted By Grenade, Then Getting Up And Gunning Down Hamas Member)

“Pretty amazing footage documenting IDF paratroopers in close-quarters combat with terrorists in Khan Yunis. Troops encounter gunfire and a grenade during the battle. Also, a miniature drone is deployed to verify enemy combatants killed,” Joe Truzman, a Foundation for the Defense of Democracies senior analyst, tweeted about the battle.

The video opened with an intense gun battle that escalated further when a Hamas fighter threw an object into a room with IDF soldiers. One of the soldiers could be heard shouting “grenade,” followed by an explosion. The shooting quickly resumed through the smoky rooms of the building. Later a drone was used to confirm two Hamas fighters were eliminated.

Emanuel Fabian, The Times of Israel’s military correspondent, described in a tweet how this battle came to be based on information from the IDF. Hamas opened fire on the troops “from several buildings” whereupon paratroopers from the 101st Battalion “called in airstrikes and tank shelling against the buildings, killing many of the gunmen.” The paratroopers then made their way into the buildings and searched for surviving Hamas fighters and in this case found “at least two gunmen were still holed up” in one building.

“The soldiers battled the remaining Hamas fighters, killing them,” Fabian tweeted, “Seven soldiers of the battalion were wounded, and a dog of the Oketz canine unit was killed in the fighting.”

This combat is but a small sample of the ongoing battle of Khan Yunis between Israel and Hamas. The intense fighting has yielded some 40 Hamas fatalities in 24 hours alone, The Jerusalem Post reported.