Israel is hiding its casualties.
and sending its young people to die in an impossible quagmire.
Good day, spectators.
So I am going to get right to it and tell you that I am almost certain the IDF is covering up its casualties, and I mean in both Gaza and more recently (and visibly), in Lebanon. The real toll of the ongoing conflict is being deliberately obscured. Despite videos abound of Hezbollah destroying Israeli tanks and medevac helicopters returning in droves from southern Lebanon, the official reports remain suspiciously…bare. For anyone familiar with Israel. this will not come as a surprise at all. The State has a long history of lying and downplaying its military losses is part of the Great Hasbara. I just wonder how many soldiers will be thrown into the meat grinder before Israelis start paying attention—after all, it’s their young people being sent into what I am calling the modern Vietnam. Let’s take a look together.
big question marks on the IDF
The Israeli ‘Defence’ Forces (IDF) maintain an official website which is supposed to report military casualties and deaths.
You can find it here: IDF Casualties
If you follow Israel’s war as closely as I do, you see very quickly that these numbers don’t add up. Updates are sporadic, often lagging behind, and when they do appear, they just seem suspiciously off. It’s as if the real toll of the conflict is being ignored.
The biggest giveaway is that this doesn’t align with the mountains of footage flooding in from southern Lebanon. It’s 2024 and it’s very easy for people to record what is going on. Hezbollah is simply releasing videos it’s members shredding the IDF to bits from densely-covered positions in the hills.
(Alleged footage of Hezbollah destroying a tank in an early Israeli offensive although this is unconfirmed.)
(Confirmed footage from Hezbollah in one of their ‘we’re still here’ videos designed to show the IDF they are still able to hit them with rockets.)
Furthermore, ‘Medevac’ helicopters are seen regularly making their way back from the frontlines to IDF hospitals transporting wounded or dead soldiers.
So where are the corresponding casualty reports? If we are to believe the official spin, Israel is emerging from these bloody clashes with highly-trained and well-armed forces unscathed. However, its history in Lebanon and common sense suggest something different—there’s no way such intense guerrilla warfare, in terrain tailor-made for Hezbollah’s tactics, isn’t costing Israel far more than they’re letting on.
israel’s vietnam
Southern Lebanon is no joke. The verdant, mountainous and forested landscape favours those whom it belongs to—the Lebanese. It’s a region where guerrilla tactics thrive: ambushes, hidden tunnels, and insurgents blending into the rugged terrain. For Israel’s heavily mechanised forces, these conditions are a nightmare become real. Tanks, artillery, and even aerial surveillance struggle to navigate the dense cover and winding hills. Every tree, every rock will have Hezbollah fighter hiding behind it, each with a chunky rocket launcher waiting to pop an invader.
Sound familiar? It should—because this is Israel’s version of the Vietnam War.
Just like the jungles of that Asian land, that ate American forces whole, the terrain of southern Lebanon is unforgiving to foreigners. The 2006 Lebanon War offered a preview of what is to come for the IDF today. Then, like now, Israel, faced fierce resistance as Hezbollah fighters hit them relentlessly with guerrilla tactics. What Israel encountered wasn’t a conventional battlefield, but a stronghold where hit-and-run tactics bled their forces dry, much like the Viet Cong did to the Americans. Casualty numbers were high, progress was slow, and victory was elusive. The terrain was Hezbollah’s ally then, and it remains so today.
This is guerrilla warfare at its finest, where knowing the land trumps having the most advanced weaponry. While Israel’s official reports may paint a picture of success, history—and the harsh lessons of Vietnam—tell us that this terrain is taking its toll, just as it always has.
they’ve lied before
Israel’s tendency to downplay casualty numbers is nothing new and it’s simply following a historical trend. Take for example, the 1982 Lebanon War, where Israel took extremely heavy losses. The full extent of those deaths was not made public until much later. They wanted to manipulate the public and maintain the perception of strength, even though they were getting their arses kicked. This very same deception repeated during the 2006 Lebanon War, when it became evident that the actual number of Israeli soldiers killed and wounded far exceeded what had been initially reported. It wasn’t until recently that they publicly acknowledged those who had been killed in the invasion.
This approach serves multiple purposes. It bolsters domestic morale, prevents panic, and shields the Israeli government from accountability and public outrage. It also preserves Israel’s image on the international stage, allowing it to project military invincibility while continuing operations without the distraction of mounting losses.
This is a well-worn playbook, and history suggests that the real numbers of deaths and injuries in this most recent invasion will only come to light once it’s politically convenient—or impossible to hide.
so what?
At this point, when Israel is hitting UN bases and killing civilians indiscriminately, the fact that they’re hiding their losses doesn’t even come as a surprise to me. While I have no sympathy for the casualties Israel is suffering, perhaps the burden lays upon the Israeli public because after all—it’s their young soldiers being thrown into this bloody gauntlet, a modern-day Vietnam that Israel refuses to fully acknowledge.
The question isn’t whether Israel is hiding its losses it’s: how long can they keep it up?
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Following Jon Elmer’s summary of armed resistance videos on the Electronic Intifada livestream for the past year, one can get a sense as to how the official IDF casualty numbers feel ‘off’.
Over the past year I've often wondered whether the Israelis are using the Sri Lankan military's brutality in 2007 to 2009 as its blueprint for the Levant (let's not kid ourselves, they've always coveted the entire region). It is perhaps the only instance where brutally and relentlessly punishing an entire civilian population seems to have worked in nullifying the LTTE. At least that's what it looks like on the surface. I can't say for sure because it's incredibly difficult to get credible information from inside the country. At the point, the only indicator seems to be the absence of violence for the last decade or so.
I'm inclined to think that it was poor tactics and leadership on the LTTE's part that had much to do with its pacification? Is it fully defeated and dismantled as the Sri Lankan government proclaims? Who knows.