How Israeli special forces undertook a daring rescue mission to save hostages taken on October 7
It was broad daylight when undercover operatives from Israel smuggled themselves into one of the most overcrowded refugee camps in the world, in what the Israeli military has described as “the ultimate surprise”.
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Holding a plastic bottle of Coca-Cola, her father putting his arms around her, Noa Argamani smiled for a photograph that restored hope to a nation - a picture that granted a mother’s dying wish.
Eight months ago on October 7, Argamani, 26, was filmed screaming on the back of a motorcycle as Hamas gunmen ripped her away from the life that she knew, shots echoing about her as the killings at the Nova music festival raged on.
Now she and three other hostages - Almog Meir Jan, 22, Andrey Kozlov, 27, and Shlomi Ziv, 41 - are safe at last, after a daring operation carried out by Israeli special forces. It has given Israel - an increasingly isolated and despairing nation - its greatest morale boost in months.
It was broad daylight when vehicles full of undercover operatives from Yamam, the secretive anti-terrorism unit of the Israeli police, and Shin Bet, the Israeli equivalent of MI5, smuggled themselves into one of the most overcrowded refugee camps in the world. It was a mission the Israeli military described as “the ultimate surprise”.
In one building in the camp Argamani was held; in a second 200 metres away the men - Meir, Kozlov and Ziv. The hostages, according to the Israel Defence Forces (IDF), were held in rooms heavily guarded by armed militants but still inhabited by Gazan civilian families.
“The tension in the command room was very, very high. When [IDF chief of staff] Herzi Halevi said the approval word, when he said go, at 11.25am, the raid started simultaneously in both buildings,” Rear-Admiral Daniel Hagari told journalists in a briefing yesterday (Saturday) afternoon.
“It was an operation like Entebbe,” Hagari said, referring to the Israeli hostage rescue in a Ugandan airport in 1976.
Israeli intelligence had learnt of the hostages’ whereabouts a fortnight earlier. Models were built to simulate the mission, but there was always a chance the hostages would be moved before they could be reached, or that they would die in the process.
“We decided to do both of them together. If we’d have chosen only one, there was a risk to the other one. The killing of our hostages was a huge risk - they would have known we were preparing for another raid,” Hagari added.
The captors holding Argamani were taken by surprise and killed swiftly by Israeli forces, who took her to the beach, where a first helicopter awaited.
EXCLUSIVE FOOTAGE from the helicopter that brought Noa back home from Hamas captivity: pic.twitter.com/PQypAUwRba
— Israel Defense Forces (@IDF) June 8, 2024
In the second flat, where the three other hostages were held, a fierce gunfight ensued as the special forces tried to leave, and Chief Inspector Arnon Zmora was critically wounded.
One of the vehicles was disabled by the firefight and had to be left behind as the convoy raced to the beach and the second waiting helicopter.
“When we started to go out from the buildings [with the hostages], a lot of fire - a lot of fire - was around us: terrorists running in the streets with RPGs [rocket-propelled grenades], into cars, at the warriors [IDF troops], many, many of them,” Hagari said.
“It needed to be like a surgical brain operation. So accurate. Imagine that in a civilian street, with a lot of people around, trucks and cars and people.” The mission was conducted as thousands roamed the camp.
Meir, Kozolv and Ziv were flown out of the strip by the second helicopter on the beach near the camp.
Hamas left 364 civilians dead at the festival where the four were captured. Argamani was seen in one of the first videos from that day on the back of a motorbike, her hands outstretched, reaching for her boyfriend as she begged not to be murdered. He is still in Gaza.
All four of the rescued hostages are said to be in good medical condition and have been transferred to a hospital in central Israel for checks.
The rescue came at a moment of national despair for Israel. Benny Gantz, seen as a more level-headed member of Israel’s intimate four-member war cabinet, was about to resign in a scheduled address last night (Saturday) over Binyamin Netanyahu’s lack of post-war planning, leaving war decisions to the whim of Israel’s far-right coalition government.
Gantz postponed his announcement as news of the raid captured the hearts of Israelis, who stopped what they were doing, breaking the quiet of the Sabbath to celebrate the hostages’ return.
A lifeguard on one of Tel Aviv’s most popular beaches announced the news on the loudspeakers in his hut. It was met with cheers and loud applause, as everyone reached for their phone to share the moment the public had been waiting for in the war. The rescue of live hostages was a triumph in its fight against Hamas.
Netanyahu said: “Yet again you have proven that Israel does not surrender to terrorism, and acts with boundless valour and resourcefulness to return home our hostages.
“We are obligated to do the same in the future. We will not relent until we complete the mission and return all our hostages home, both the living and the deceased.”
World leaders welcomed an operation that has raised the hopes of the Israeli people.
Speaking in Paris at the end of a week commemorating the D-Day landings, President Biden promised that America “won’t stop working until all the hostages are home and a ceasefire is reached. That’s essential to happen.”
President Macron also congratulated Israel on the release of the hostages, while the German chancellor, Olaf Scholz, called the rescue “an important sign of hope”.
Israel’s defence minister, Yoav Gallant, said: “This is one of the most heroic and extraordinary operations I have witnessed over the course of 47 years serving in Israel’s defence establishment.”
The rescue operation came amid heavy strikes on central Gaza over the past few days, intensifying yesterday (Saturday). The Hamas media office said 210 people were killed and more than 400 wounded.
Earlier last week an Israeli air strike on a school in Nuseirat camp, central Gaza - where the IDF claimed Hamas fighters were sheltering - killed at least 35 people, among them children. Hamas accused Israel of engaging in “brutal and savage aggression”.
Residents there said the dead and injured victims of the intense Israeli bombardment were overflowing from the corridors of the al-Aqsa hospital. Al-Aqsa is said to be the only functioning medical facility in central Gaza after Israel’s all-out offensive over the past several days.
Previous rescue operations have been costly to Israel, which has brought home the bodies of an estimated 19 hostages, including three who were killed by their would-be rescuers as they waved a makeshift white flag.
Ori Megidish, an observer soldier who was kidnapped while serving on the Gaza border on October 7, was rescued in an operation early in the war, and two kibbutz-dwellers, Louis Har and Fernando Marman, were rescued in Rafah in February.
Argamani was held on her own, under the watchful guard of Hamas fighters, until an Israeli helicopter flew her back to Israel. She was received at the Sheba medical centre, whose doctors have a strict protocol for receiving hostages that includes psychological and social treatment, with special care taken after concerns were raised over hostages undergoing sexual trauma and abuse in captivity. Argamani had been last seen alive in January in a video published by Hamas, in which she was forced to announce the death of two other Israeli hostages.
At least 43 of the 120 hostages still in Gaza are no longer thought to be alive, according to Israel. Negotiations for the release of the remaining captives are continuing as part of a ceasefire plan proposed by Israel and heavily backed by the US administration, after more than 100 Israeli and foreign nationals were released during a week-long ceasefire in November last year.
Argamani’s mother, Liora, has stage 4 brain cancer and has previously appealed to world leaders to grant her dying wish to see her daughter one last time. On the day of her rescue, the emotional scenes have changed the mood for four families and for the Israeli public.
Liora pleaded in March: “I am asking you, President Joe Biden. I don’t have a lot of time left in this world. It may be my last wish. I’m really begging you. Please help me.”
The mother and daughter were reunited last night (Saturday). For one family in this war, their wish has been granted.
For others on both sides of this conflict, the torment continues.
From The Sunday Times, London
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