19-year-old Corporal Gilad Shalit was abducted by Arabs on June 25, 2006 during an early morning attack on an Israeli army post in which two IDF soldiers were killed - St. Sgt. Pavel Slutzker and Lt. Hanan Barak -and four wounded (in addition to Shalit). The attackers/kidnappers came from Gaza into Israel via an underground tunnel.
On Wednesday, July 12, Hez b'Allah (party of god) terrorists in Lebanon initiated a massive shelling attack on the north of Israel, in the midst of which a party of unknown number crossed into Israel and attacked two IDF Hummer jeeps with gunfire and explosives. Three Israeli soldiers were killed in that attack and two were taken hostage.
The three killed were identified as 22-year-old S. Sgt. Eyal Banin from Beer Sheva,24-year-old Sergeant First Class Shani Turgeman of Beit Shean
and 27-year-old Wassam Nazal from the town of Jat-Yanuch.
The two missing Israeli reserve soldiers were identified on Thursday as
Eldad Regev, a university student who also works for Bezeq, lives with his older brother in the family's home in Kiryat Motzkin, just north of Haifa.
Ehud Goldwasser is a student at Haifa's Technion and lives with his wife in the Haifa suburb of Nesher. Goldwasser's family home is in Nahariya, though his parents currently reside in South Africa for work. His brother is also overseas, traveling in India.
Later Wednesday, in pursuit of the abductors, an Israeli Merkava tank hit a buried (300 kg. or 660 lbs.) bomb some 6 kilometers (about 3.7 miles) inside Lebanese territory; the tank was destroyed and all four IDF soldiers within were killed. They were:
Commander of the tank, Sgt. Gadi Musayev, 20 years old from Akko, son of Eliezer and Rosa.St.-Sgt. Yaniv Bar-On, 20 years old from Macabbim, son of Caroline and Asher, Zionist olim from Canada and South Africa, respectively.
St.-Sgt. Shlomi Yirmiyahu, 20 years old, from the Ramat Eliyahu neighborhood in Rishon Letzion, son of Ruti and David;
and St.-Sgt. Alexei Kurshnirsky [Kushniraski], 21 years old from Ness Ziona, son of Illiya and Marina.
Another IDF soldier - Nimrod Cohen - was killed while trying to extricate their bodies under heavy enemy fire.
He Who blessed our forefathers Abraham, Isaac and Jacob -- may He bless the fighters of the Israel Defense Forces, who stand guard over our land and the cities of our God, from the border of the Lebanon to the desert of Egypt, and from the Great Sea unto the approach of the Aravah, on the land, in the air, and on the sea.May the Almighty cause the enemies who rise up against us to be struck down before them. May the Holy One, Blessed is He, preserve and rescue our fighters from every trouble and distress and from every plague and illness, and may He send blessing and success in their every endeavor.
May He lead our enemies under our soldiers' sway and may He grant them salvation and crown them with victory. And may there be fulfilled for them the verse: For it is the Lord your God, Who goes with you to battle your enemies for you to save you.
Now let us respond: Amen.
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