Israeli military search and rescue teams working since a devastating earthquake struck southeastern Turkey earlier this week have so far pulled ten Turkish civilians out of the rubble, the Israel Defense Forces said on Thursday morning.
The delegation from the IDF Home Front Command began work on Tuesday, a day after a 7.8-magnitude earthquake struck the region and killed thousands.
Meanwhile, a second IDF delegation that landed in the country on Wednesday began setting up a field hospital on the outskirts of the city of Kahramanmaras overnight.
The IDF said 15 air force cargo planes brought hundreds of tons of equipment and some 230 participants, including search and rescue specialists, military medics and health ministry doctors, nurses and paramedics, to set up a hospital in Turkey.
The first IDF delegation of 150 search-and-rescue specialists continued to work to rescue civilians trapped under rubble in the quake-hit city on Thursday morning, rescuing a 26-year-old woman and a 65-year-old man. Also known as Marsh.
The military published footage of the rescue.
Speaking to reporters Wednesday afternoon, Col. (Res.) Golan Vach, head of the aid delegation, said Israeli teams had seen successes.
“I think the state [of Israel] And Home Front Command knows how to do such tasks at short notice. The speed with which we reached the spot is what brought us to these results and I am hopeful that we will achieve more results soon,” he said.
Vach said that such IDF aid delegations usually stay between nine and 14 days, and in this case, were prepared to stay that long.
Col. (Res.) Golan Vach at the scene of IDF search and rescue efforts following an earthquake in Turkey, February 8, 2023. (Israel Defense Forces)
The military has dubbed the aid operation “olive branches”.
The IDF Home Front Command is regularly dispatched around the world to assist with natural disasters, including earthquakes, wildfires, floods and building collapses.
Israeli military field hospitals are regularly dispatched to disaster areas to provide humanitarian relief.
As the IDF moves from the initial search and rescue phase to the long term phase of providing medical care with a field hospital, they are setting up their camp outside Marash to be a bit more homely.
Here they are setting up a field kitchen to vastly improve their food. pic.twitter.com/bwanKFbhud
— Judah Ari Gross (@JudahAriGross) February 9, 2023
several delegations of Israeli medics from emergency organizations He has also gone to Turkey to assist local authorities in treating earthquake victims.
The Foreign Ministry was weighing an additional flight to Turkey containing humanitarian goods and medicines.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Monday that Israel also plans to send aid to Syria, including tents, medicine and blankets. But Syrian sources vehemently denied requesting aid from Israel, and IDF spokesman Ran Kochav told reporters that the army was not involved in potential aid to Syria.
Collapsed buildings are seen in Antakya, southern Turkey, on February 8, 2023. Nearly two days after a 7.8-magnitude earthquake struck southeastern Turkey and northern Syria, rescuers are still pulling more people out of the rubble of thousands of buildings a short distance away. (AP Photo/Khalil Hamra)
Israel considers Syria a hostile state, and the two do not have diplomatic relations. However, during the neighboring country’s bloody civil war, the IDF conducted large-scale humanitarian operations to aid Syrian civilians.
As of Thursday morning, the death toll from the earthquake in both Turkey and Syria was at least 16,000.
Hundreds are still believed to be trapped under the rubble, and the death toll is expected to rise as rescue workers search through piles of rubble in cities and towns across the region.
