Beit Lahia, May 2024. Yoni and his group comb through destroyed buildings and give the go-ahead to bulldozers to destroy more. It's a day like any other in Gaza, until it's not.
When someone shouts "terrorists!", Yoni, who is actually named something else, throws himself at a machine gun and starts shooting. He fires hundreds of bullets, he tells the Israeli newspaper Haaretz. But when the soldiers move forward, they see no terrorists. Only children.
I saw two child bodies, maybe eight or ten years old, I don't know. There was blood everywhere, he says to the newspaper.
I knew it was me who was guilty, that I did this. I wanted to vomit.
A few minutes later, the company commander approaches. "They entered a death zone, it's their own fault", the commander says, according to Yoni.
After the incident, Yoni asks to speak with a psychologist, who recommends that he not return to combat. Like a steadily growing number of soldiers, he has now been given a different role in the army. According to Haaretz, thousands have had to leave the front due to mental health problems.
"A mistake"
Benny, a sniper in another brigade in Gaza, has asked to leave the army entirely. As a sniper, he oversees the distribution of aid in northern Gaza. When the trucks arrive, the residents move forward to get a good spot in line, but in front of them is a line that is not visible.
If they cross that line, I have to shoot them, says Benny, who also testifies under a pseudonym, to Haaretz.
He describes it as a "cat and mouse game". The Gazans come from different directions and the commanders shout, "shoot!"
I fire 50-60 bullets every day, I've stopped counting the dead. I have no idea how many I've killed, many. Children.
Benny has started wetting himself. At night, he sees the people he has killed; one night he dreamed that he killed his own family.
I won't last another minute here. I did it because I thought I was protecting my friends and family, but it was a mistake. I don't believe in the commanders, I don't believe in the government.
Deserters imprisoned
Since the outbreak of war in 2023, over 50 Israeli soldiers have taken their own lives, reported Haaretz at the end of July. The news followed a particularly difficult month: in July alone, seven soldiers committed suicide. In the years before the war, the number was around a dozen soldiers per year.
Between October 7, 2023, and the end of July 2025, around 3,770 Israeli soldiers were diagnosed with PTSD, according to the public service company Kan. The dark figure is assumed to be large.
Thousands more are estimated to have left the army to never return, writes Haaretz. Some are told they are "traitors" and threatened with imprisonment.
Several soldiers have according to The Times of Israel been imprisoned for their refusal to serve.
The war in Gaza broke out after a terrorist-stamped Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, 2023. Over 1,100 people were killed and around 250 were taken hostage.
About 140 of the hostages have been released alive through negotiations and eight have been rescued by Israel's military, according to a compilation by the news agency AP.
Israel's bombings have killed over 65,000 Palestinians in Gaza, according to the Hamas-controlled area's health department. The figures, which do not distinguish between civilians and combatants, are often cited by UN agencies and international organizations.
In the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague, a trial has been ongoing since December 2023 in which South Africa accuses Israel of genocide.
The International Criminal Court (ICC) has issued international arrest warrants for Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, the country's former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, and now deceased leaders within Hamas. The charges concern war crimes and crimes against humanity.
Source: ICJ, AP, UN
