Israeli Politicsupdated 18m ago3 min read
Explosion Near Neot Mordechai Kills 15-Year-Old, Injures 19 on Israeli School Trip
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A 15-year-old student was killed and about 19 injured on a northern Israel school trip. Initial reports indicate the blast was from unexploded ordnance, possibly Hezbollah-origin cluster munition.
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Blast hits school trip
An explosion in northern Israel near the Lebanese border killed at least one person and injured 19 others during a school trip, with Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz posting on X that authorities were looking into the cause of the blast. Gideon Saar said the victim was a 15-year-old who had gone on an annual school trip, and Israeli police said “the initial suspicion is that it was caused by an unexploded ordnance.” The blast occurred near the community of Neot Mordechai, between Kibbutz Manara and Kibbutz Yiftach, and the municipality of Maalot-Tarshiha said it injured students and staff from a religious high school on an outing.
Israeli police and medics described varying injury severity, while the Israeli rescue service Magen David Adom reported “eight people injured with injuries ranging from serious to moderate.” The Israeli Army dispatched troops and helicopters to the scene as the incident remained under investigation, and Al Jazeera’s Nour Odeh said the blast “mobilised” Israel’s political echelons.
Competing explanations and politics
Israeli media reporting described the blast as a “disaster,” and Channel 15 later reported the number of injured had risen to 24, while Al Jazeera’s Mohammed Khoury said the blast injured students from a religious school named “Urt.” The Israeli Army said preliminary results indicated the incident was caused by a Hezbollah cluster bomb that remained in the area and exploded, while Israel Police Commissioner said authorities had not yet confirmed whether the blast was caused by a device or a missile warhead from past conflicts. Yair Golan of the Israeli Democratic Party called for locating and removing unexploded ordnance remnants in the north, writing on X, “Three years of fighting has also produced dangers in the field that cannot be ignored.”
Netanyahu’s office issued directives to transfer the injured to hospitals and continued assessments after receiving a briefing on the details of the “serious incident,” and Al Jazeera’s reporting said Netanyahu headed to the area. Al Jazeera also reported that National Security Minister Ben Gvir canceled a political engagement that was on his agenda as the blast unfolded near the Lebanon border.
Aftermath and what comes next
Israeli emergency services and the army continued rescue operations after the blast, and the Israeli Army said forces were still sweeping the area and working to remove shrapnel from the explosion site. The Israeli Ministry of Education confirmed that the area was open to the public and that the route hikers took was permitted for passage, while Israeli police stated that elements of its forces and specialized teams moved to the explosion site near Kibbutz Yiftach to determine its source. Israel Police Commissioner announced a reduction in trips in the coming days to reassess how dangerous they are to children, and the Israeli Army deployed three military helicopters to the blast site accompanied by rescue teams.
In parallel, Al Jazeera reported that thousands of Israelis living in the north were forced to leave the region after Hezbollah started firing rockets following Israel’s 2023 war in Gaza, and Odeh said most residents have not returned because they “did not have the confidence” that the government will be able to protect them. Al Jazeera also framed the incident as a reminder that Northern Israel, the upper Galilee, and the border with Lebanon remain an area where there is a military operation and where thousands of munitions were used over the past 3 years.