An Israeli military reservist raised in Maryland was killed Friday when anti-tank missile fire struck his unit near Israel’s northern border with Lebanon, the Israeli military said.

Omer Balva, 22, was among the 360,000 reservists that the Israeli government had mobilised in an immense increase in its military forces before an expected ground invasion of Gaza.

Balva was a staff sergeant in the 9203rd battalion of the Alexandroni Brigade, according to the Israeli military.

He moved to Israel after graduating from high school in Rockville, Maryland, in 2019 and was a student at Reichman University in Herzliya, Israel, where he was pursuing a degree in business administration and economics.

Ethan Missner, a close friend of Balva’s since childhood, said that the two had talked “almost daily” for their entire lives, except when Balva was training with the Israeli military.

“Since we were 6 years old, I’ve spent, you know, endless time with him,” he said.

“I truthfully don’t know a single person that’s ever fought with Omer,” Missner added. “And I think that that’s a superpower Omer had, that he can know and be close to so many people and he was just only sweet.” Balva was on vacation in the US when he was called up to fight in Israel, Missner said.

New York Times News Service