Gaza’s Grim Math — What Are We Really Fighting For?

Killed In Gaza - Courtesy Times Of Israel

 

Since the so-called “ceasefire” collapsed in March, 41 Israeli soldiers have been killed and hundreds more wounded. In that same time, the number of living hostages believed to remain in Gaza has dwindled to roughly twenty. Thirty are confirmed dead. Let that sink in: We are trading 41 living soldiers — fathers, sons, husbands, brothers — for the chance, not the certainty, of rescuing twenty possibly living hostages.

What am I missing?

We were told this war, at least in part, was about bringing our people home. That the trauma of October 7 demanded not just justice, but rescue. Yet the rescue is slipping away — one life at a time — and the war machine marches on, largely unchanged.

It’s hard to escape the conclusion that the hostages have become cover for a broader campaign. A war that was once framed as a moral imperative is now increasingly defined by strategic abstraction. “We are dismantling Hamas,” we are told. But what does that mean when Hamas leaders remain at large and its fighting force keeps reappearing — like weeds in ruins?

If this is no longer a hostage rescue mission, then what is it?

The government might say: This is about long-term deterrence. About securing Israel’s borders. About making sure October 7 never happens again. But ask any parent burying a soldier this week whether those goals feel clear, and you’ll get something murkier: confusion, exhaustion, grief.

The Gaza campaign is now a war without end, without metrics, without honesty.

It’s a war where numbers don’t lie, but leaders do.

Because if the truth were spoken plainly — that we are sacrificing dozens of soldiers for hostages who may already be dead, that Gaza will never be fully pacified, that Hamas will likely outlast this government — then the Israeli public would demand something politicians cannot afford: accountability.

This isn’t just a military quagmire. It’s a moral one.

The bitter irony is that every additional soldier lost makes it harder to stop. Politicians don’t want to admit that those 41 lives may have been lost for nothing. So more must be sent. More must die. All to justify the ones who already have.

This is the sunk-cost fallacy written in blood.

What I’m missing isn’t logic — it’s courage. The courage from our leaders to level with the nation, to admit that our objectives have drifted, our goals are unclear, and our young men are dying in a war that no longer makes sense.

Until then, the math will continue to haunt us.

And the dead will keep outnumbering the rescued.

 

https://blogs.timesofisrael.com/gazas-grim-math-what-are-we-really-fighting-for/

 

Three more karbonot today! 

Three IDF troops killed, officer seriously wounded in northern Gaza fighting

Today, 10:08 pm

Sgt. Shlomo Yakir Shrem (left) and Staff Sgt. Shoham Menahem (right), killed during fighting in northern Gaza on July 14, 2025, alongside Sgt. Yuliy Faktor who is not pictured. (Israel Defense Forces)

Three IDF troops were killed and an officer was seriously wounded during fighting in the northern Gaza Strip today, the military announces.

The slain troops are named as:

Staff Sgt. Shoham Menahem, 21, from Yardena

Sgt. Shlomo Yakir Shrem, 20, from Efrat

Sgt. Yuliy Faktor, 19, from Rishon Lezion

They all served with the 401st Armored Brigade’s 52nd Battalion.

According to an initial IDF probe, the soldiers were in a tank that was likely hit by anti-tank fire. Other causes of the explosion are being investigated.

The incident took place in northern Gaza’s Jabalia at around noon.

https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog_entry/three-idf-troops-killed-officer-seriously-wounded-in-northern-gaza-fighting/?