Eight Israeli soldiers were killed in southern Gaza on Saturday, the Israel Defense Forces say, in one of the deadliest incidents since October 7.
The IDF said the incident was still under consideration, but preliminary findings indicated that an armored vehicle carrying soldiers as part of a column had been hit by an explosion around 5:15 a.m. local time during an operation targeting "terrorist infrastructure" in the northwestern part of Tal al-Sultan.
"According to the information we have at this point, one of the engineering vehicles in the column was hit by an explosion that was apparently caused by explosive devices placed in the area or as a result of antitank rocket fire," IDF spokesman Daniel Hagary told a news conference.
"The current assessment is that the Nemera armored vehicle was hit as a result of a side bomb explosion. In addition, there were engineering tools in the vehicle that included explosive materials. The explosion was strong and may have been caused by the ignition of explosive material in the vehicle. All this is not supposed to happen and therefore the incident is being reviewed," the IDF said.