Video seems to show Hamas fighter running up to an Israeli tank, planting an explosive on it, then shooting it

Mia Jankowicz
Updated Fri, 3 November 2023 

A still from footage released by Hamas' Al-Qassam brigade on November 2 2023, showing the moment a fighter places a device on an Israeli tank.Al-Qassam Brigades/Telegram

Hamas' fighters released footage purporting to show an Israeli tank under attack.


It's one of a number of videos documenting the group's guerrilla tactics against heavy armor.

The IDF said it has killed Hamas' head of anti-tank units.

Hamas released footage that appears to show the guerrilla-style destruction of an Israeli tank in Gaza.

In what appears to be helmet-cam footage, the fighter spies a number of tanks from behind bushes. He then rushes out and places an explosive on one of them, before dashing away.

From behind cover, he fires a rocket-propelled grenade and a brief burst of flame is seen in the distance. The tank struck appears to be one of Israel's Merkava main battle tanks.

In a second clip, a fighter picks up pieces of metal detritus, with the captions claiming they are the remains of the same tank.

The video, released on Thursday, can be seen in this post on X:

The explosion may have been the result of the Merkava's Trophy active protection system activating, as The Drive reported.

Insider was unable to verify the footage, and a spokesperson for the IDF declined to comment.

It's one of several videos released by the Al-Qassam Brigade, the wing of Hamas that led the mass assault on October 7. Both Hamas and Al-Qassam are separately designated as terrorist organizations by an array of countries.

According to commentary attached to the video on the group's channels, the fighter fired an Al-Yassin-105 shell at the tank, which was said to be east of Gaza's Al-Zaytoun neighborhood.

The IDF said on Wednesday that it killed the head of the Hamas anti-tank missile unit, Muhammad A'sar, in an air strike, according to Sky News.

Israel's troops moved two miles into Gaza on Monday, according to a CNN analysis. The IDF says it lost 16 fighters in the ground operation, per Sky News.

Hamas claims to have destroyed several tanks in Gaza since then.

Helmet-cam footage shared on Wednesday appeared to show tanks being targeted by fighters from tunnels and from behind brush cover, in strikes the group says were also east of Al-Zaytoun.

Following Israel's declaration of war on Hamas, the commander of Israel's armored corps, Brigadier General Hisham Ibrahim told The Economist that the forces' tank divisions would not repeat the mistakes made by Russia in its invasion of Ukraine.

"They fought there in a single-corps fashion, instead of using combined arms tactics," Ibrahim said.

That is to say, Israel wouldn't be sending tank formations out alone — as Russia so disastrously did — but would use them in combination with infantry, artillery, air cover and intelligence support.

That video did not align with that — there were no visible infantry or other forces who acted to stop the Hamas fighter. Some commentators said that Israel had made a mistake by not posting infantry near its tank.

Tanks in general have been shown to be far more vulnerable to highly-powered, inexpensive munitions in recent conflicts. In Russia's case, large numbers of tanks were left to be picked off from a safe distance by Ukraine's nimble forces.

Analysts have predicted that Israel's fight in Gaza — which has seen massive civilian destruction — would not be a lightning offensive.

Shlomo Brom, an IDF director of strategic planning, told The Guardian that taking the north of Gaza — where the IDF believes most of Hamas is based — "will be slow, very hard."