TEHRAN – Israel’s war on Gaza, launched on October 7, 2023, with the declared aim of defeating Hamas, has ended not in triumph but in trauma. After two years of relentless bombardment, mass displacement, and regional destabilization, the Israeli government reached a ceasefire with Hamas on October 10, 2025 — a ceasefire it has since violated repeatedly. But beyond the devastation inflicted on Palestinians, the war has exacted a staggering toll on Israel’s own military ranks.

A newly published report by the Knesset Research and Information Center reveals that between January 2024 and July 2025, 279 IDF soldiers attempted suicide. For every soldier who died by suicide, seven more tried to take their own lives. Combat troops — the very backbone of Israel’s war machine — accounted for 78% of all suicide cases in 2024, a dramatic spike from previous years. The psychological cost of Israel’s military adventurism is no longer deniable.

The report, requested by lawmaker Ofer Cassif, lays bare the consequences of prolonged deployments, exposure to harrowing scenes, and the loss of comrades. Most of the soldiers who died had not received mental health support in the weeks before their deaths. The IDF’s own internal investigation concluded that the suicides stemmed from war-induced trauma. In other words, Israel’s war on Gaza has not only failed to achieve its strategic goals — it has shattered the very soldiers sent to enforce them.

Knesset report records 279 suicide attempts among Israeli soldiers in 18 months This is not a story of military victory. It is a story of institutional collapse, moral erosion, and human suffering. The Israeli government, having mobilized tens of thousands of reservists in pursuit of a war it could not win, now faces a suicide epidemic within its own ranks. Cassif’s warning is chillingly apt: “The suicide epidemic… requires the creation of real support systems for soldiers, and above all, bringing about an end to the wars and making true peace.”

But peace is not on the horizon. Israel continues to violate the ceasefire, prolonging instability and deepening despair. Meanwhile, Palestinians remain under siege — displaced, bereaved, and defiant. Hamas, the target of Israel’s war, has survived. Gaza, though battered, has not been broken. And Israel, in its failure, has turned its violence inward.

The war on Gaza was not just a failure of strategy. It was a failure of humanity. And now, the cost is being paid in blood — not only in Gaza, but in the barracks of the IDF.