Former Israeli Navy combat sailors will undergo training as infantry soldiers and will participate in combat in Gaza, the north, and Judea and Samaria as part of a new battalion that was created in memory of terror victim Hallel Yaniv.
Kan News reported that Deputy Chief of Staff Maj. Gen. Amir Baram promoted the process to overcome the IDF's shortage of combat soldiers. The reserve battalion will consist of former Navy sailors who will serve under the 96th Light Infantry Reserve Division.
The battalion will be named the Hallel Battalion after Hallel Yaniv, a deputy commander of a ship in the 916th patrol squadron who was murdered with his brother, Yagel, in a terror attack in Samaria in February 2023.
The new initiative will see former sailors who in the past have received exemptions from reserve duty undergoing concentrated infantry training. Most of the sailors have already undergone naval combat training, but they will now learn urban combat and how to utilize various weapons on dry land as opposed to a ship.
In recent days the IDF has begun to gather a list of servicemen for the new battalion. The initiation exercise is expected to take place in about two months.