Israel is considering recruiting young Jews abroad amid a severe shortage of troops for its ongoing genocidal war against the besieged Gaza Strip.

The Israeli army, in a radio report on Monday, said it faces a shortage of between 10,000 and 12,000 soldiers, primarily due to the refusal of ultra-Orthodox Jews to perform military service.

Faced with this situation, the army plans to focus on the Jewish communities in the United States and France, with the goal of recruiting around 700 people annually.

It is also reportedly seeking to attract some 30,000 asylum seekers from African countries to its ranks by offering them permanent residency in the occupied territories.

In July, the Israeli daily Maariv revealed that senior Zionist military commanders acknowledged for the first time the extent of the attrition, estimating a shortage of some 7,500 soldiers.

The shortage has exacerbated other problems in the Israeli military, including equipment shortages and an overstretched reserve system after 22 months of fighting in Gaza.

Battalion leaders reported overwhelming workloads, some announcing plans for early retirement, and many reservists have reported psychological problems and exhaustion related to the genocidal war.

Suicide among Israeli soldiers

An Israeli military investigation has found a rise in suicides among its soldiers, with the majority of cases directly linked to the profound psychological trauma and exposure to extreme conditions experienced during the genocidal war in Gaza.

The findings indicated that most suicides arose from prolonged exposure to combat, traumatic experiences on the battlefield, and psychological pressure resulting from the loss of comrades.

Despite the Israeli military’s attempts to suppress reports of suicides and the circumstances surrounding them, evidence of a dramatic increase in these cases continues to emerge. Media outlets have suggested that the actual number of suicides may be even higher than reported.

The Israeli military has reportedly buried some of these soldiers without military funerals or public announcements, in a desperate effort to conceal the scale of the crisis.

In recent months, growing personnel shortages have led the Israeli military to call up soldiers diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) , as they increasingly report experiencing “war trauma, family problems, and psychological distress.”

Despite the opposition, much of Israeli society , and numerous reservists’ opposition to the continuation of the war, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s extremist cabinet has decided to expand the offensive and occupy the entire Palestinian Strip.

Critics accuse the Zionist prime minister of prolonging the conflict to ensure his political survival, disregarding the lives of his troops or the fate of the Israeli detainees remaining in Gaza.