TEHRAN- The Israeli military announced on Monday that two more Israeli troops have been killed in northern Gaza. A day earlier, it announced that 15 soldiers had been killed in combat over 48 hours in Gaza. Another was killed on Friday by rocket fire from Lebanon. 

Many more have been wounded with more than a dozen in serious condition. 

The armed wing of Hamas, the al-Qassam brigades, contradicted the numbers saying, "Our fighters have confirmed the killing of 48 Zionist soldiers, the wounding of dozens, and have carried out 24 combat missions during the past four days." 

Palestinian resistance fighters in the blockaded enclave are waging fierce battles against the Israeli occupation forces who are trying to penetrate into several areas inside the Strip. 

The regime is now announcing on an almost daily basis the names of its troops that have been killed in Gaza. 

The latest announcements are one of the largest to date since the Israeli ground offensives began. The Israeli military released the names of the 17 soldiers. 

According to Al Jazeera, Hamas’s chief in the Gaza Strip, Yahya al-Sinwar, who is on top of the list of Israeli assassination targets, sent an important message to the leaders and members of the movement’s political bureau. 

Al-Sinwar indicated that the al-Qassam brigades are waging a fierce and unprecedented battle against the Israeli occupation forces and that the Israeli army has suffered heavy losses in lives and equipment. 

Al-Sinwar added, according to sources close to Hamas, that al-Qassam brigades targeted - during the Israeli ground offensives - no less than 5,000 soldiers and officers, a third of whom were killed, another third seriously injured, and the last third permanently disabled. As for military vehicles, they have destroyed 750 completely or partially. 

In the letter, al-Sinwar said the al-Qassam brigades is continuing on the path to crushing the Israeli army and that it will not submit to the conditions of the occupation regime. 

On December 13, the regime announced that so far tens of its elite troops had been killed in the northern Shajaiye neighborhood, including two of the highest-ranking commanders, in what was then the deadliest single-day casualty counts since the ground offensives began in late October. 

The rising Israeli army fatalities are a heavy toll for a regime that has long been averse to casualties of war. 

The military casualties are also leading to a rising public outcry among Israeli settlers. 

Some experts have said the actual number of Israeli soldiers who have been killed by the Palestinian resistance forces could be in the thousands, with the regime's military maintaining a level of secrecy amid fears of a public backlash that will force it to end the war in disgrace. 

Thousands of Israeli troops have also been injured, with Israeli media reporting that out of the 5,000 soldiers hospitalized, at least 1,000 have been disabled for life. 

Judging by some opinion polls, the public support for the regime's war on the enclave appears to be eroding. 

"Over time, the public will find it hard to ignore the heavy price paid, as well as the suspicion that the aims that were loudly heralded are still far from being attained and that Hamas is showing no signs of capitulating in the near future," wrote Amos Harel, military affairs commentator, for the Haaretz newspaper. 

The latest fatalities represent some of the bloodiest days of the conflict so far, yet they strongly suggest Hamas is still as committed to its cause of resistance as it was since its creation. 

Furthermore, the death toll suggests the armed wing of Hamas is as powerful as it was on October 7. 

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Sunday that "the war is exacting a very heavy cost from us; however, we have no choice [but] to continue to fight."

Despite Israel’s boasting about taking control of Jabaliya, an area north of Gaza City, heavy Israeli bombardment and exchange of gunfire with the resistance has taken place in the area. 

Hamas’ armed wing said its forces shelled Israeli troops in the Jabaliya refugee camp. 

What is clear is that the Israeli army appears to be trapped in Gaza with no military strategy to defeat the Palestinian resistance. 

The regime claims that after ground offensives it has achieved almost complete "operational control" over northern Gaza. 

This has turned out to be another carefully planned fake Israeli government and military propaganda campaign. 

The Palestinian resistance says it is engaged in heavy street clashes with the occupation forces and inflicting heavy losses on the regime's military troops and vehicles in the northern parts of the Gaza Strip. 

Reporters on the ground say fierce battles are taking place between the resistance and the occupation forces in the northeastern areas of the Tal al-Zaatar area of Jabalia camp, and that the resistance thwarted an Israeli military attempt to penetrate the camp. 

Reports say the armed wing of Hamas targeted another two Israeli Merkava tanks with Al Yassin 105 shells on the outskirts of the Jabalia al-Balad area, north of the Gaza Strip. 

According to reports and sources, it does not appear like the Israeli regime is anywhere close to claiming control of northern Gaza. 

It does suggest that almost everything the regime had attacked in the north was against civilians, and the south of Gaza is being bombarded further with Palestinian women and children paying the highest price again. 

According to the United Nations, one Israeli strike has killed more than 70 members of an extended family, including a veteran UN aid worker. 

Issam al-Mughrabi, aged 56, was killed with his wife, five children, and dozens of other relatives in a bombing near Gaza City. 

"The loss of Issam and his family has deeply affected us all," the head of the UN development program Achim Steiner said. "The UN and civilians in Gaza are not a target. This war must end. No more families should endure the pain and suffering that Issam’s family and countless others are experiencing." 

On average, one or two UN employees are being killed in Gaza each day, with more than 130 in total. 

That toll is "something we have never seen in the history of the United Nations," said its secretary general, Antonio Guterres. 

In yet another massacre, an air strike that hit central Gaza’s Maghazi refugee camp? has killed at least 106 people, many of whom women and children. 

The indiscriminate attacks are adding pressure on Netanyahu's war cabinet from families (and their supporters) of the captives in Gaza, who are calling for a ceasefire to allow for their release. 

The real question is whether the Israeli ground forces operating inside the Gaza Strip are trapping themselves into a quagmire.