The suicide death of a former Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) officer, Tomas Adzgauskas, on Dec. 3, highlights one of the long-term costs that Israeli society is paying for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s genocidal wars to dominate the region, especially in Gaza. Adzgauskas had fought Hamas on Oct. 7, 2023 and then in Gaza, before being discharged from the Army in April 2024.
In a post he published before taking his life, he said that his life had been ruined on Oct. 7, “the date which ruined everything I had been,” he wrote on Facebook, Haaretz reported on Dec. 5. “I can’t do it anymore; I’m all ruin and destruction…. I did unforgivable things and can’t live with it any longer. No one understands me anyway,” he added.
“There is a demon inside me that’s been haunting me since October 7. Please forget me and remember Tomas Adzgauskas, who was an officer who commanded snipers. That Tomas was killed on October 7; I’m just some soul looking for its own peace; for two years I haven’t been able to live with myself,” he said.
According to official IDF figures, there has been a rise in the number of soldiers who have died by suicide while on active duty, since the war began, compared to previous years. This includes conscript soldiers and reservists. Between Oct. 7 and the end of 2023, there were 7 soldiers on active duty who took their own lives. In 2024, the number was 24. Since the beginning of 2025, at least 20 more soldiers on active duty have committed suicide. In the decade preceding the war, the number of soldiers committing suicide averaged at 12 a year.
