How Israel pulled off a high-risk hostage rescue
The searing midday sun afforded the Israeli commandos the element of surprise. It was an unusual tactic, and risky. But if they could pull off it would give Israel a huge psychological boost.
The searing midday sun afforded the Israeli commandos the element of surprise.
It was an unusual tactic, and risky. The fear, Israeli military officials said, was that Hamas guards would kill the four hostages as soon as they detected the specialist Israeli counter-terrorism teams approaching. But if they could pull off, it would give Israel a big psychological boost in a war that has been turning into a quagmire while steadily isolating the country from the rest of the world.
At 11.25am local time on Saturday, the Israeli military’s Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi was watching the situation from a command center of the Shin Bet security agency and gave the order to go.
The Israeli teams overwhelmed the captors hunkered down in two apartment blocks in Nuseirat, in the center of the Gaza Strip, Israel’s military later said. The teams came under fire as they left the buildings, leading to a street battle before the soldiers extracted the four hostages via helicopters on the beach.
EXCLUSIVE FOOTAGE from the helicopter that brought Noa back home from Hamas captivity: pic.twitter.com/PQypAUwRba
— Israel Defense Forces (@IDF) June 8, 2024
One Israeli officer was fatally wounded. The Israeli military said close to 100 Palestinians were killed or wounded, including Hamas militants and civilians caught in the crossfire.
Hamas, which seized over 240 hostages in the October 7 attack on southern Israel that triggered the war, called Saturday’s Israeli operation “brutal and barbaric.” It said 210 Palestinians were killed and 400 wounded, without specifying the number that were combatants.
Saturday’s rescue was a rare moment of national joy in Israel in the midst of a deep national crisis. In Tel Aviv, beachgoers cheered when a lifeguard reported the rescue on the PA system. Some television anchors broke into tears as they announced the news.
For Palestinian civilians sheltering from the eight-month war in Gaza, it was another day of airstrikes, death and mourning. Residents in Nuseirat described it as one of the worst days of the war, saying they didn’t know what was happening as bombs rained down. Some also voiced anger at Hamas for holding hostages in residential buildings, endangering the whole area.
Before Saturday, Israeli military actions had saved only three hostages held in Gaza by Hamas or other militants. Often, Israeli forces have had intelligence on hostages’ whereabouts but the location made it too difficult to bring them out alive, according to military officials.
Acting when the captors least expected it – in broad daylight – provided an advantage that justified the risk, said the Israeli military’s chief spokesman, Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari.
He described an elaborate operation that he compared to Israel’s most famous hostage rescue –– the 1976 raid at the Entebbe airport in Uganda, when Israeli special forces saved dozens of hostages taken by Palestinian hijackers.
For months, a small team of US military personnel has been helping the Israeli search for hostages, using drones. Before Saturday’s raid, 120 people taken on Oct. 7 remained captive in Gaza, of whom dozens have died.
In May, Israel located the female hostage Noa Argamani in a low-rise apartment block in Nuseirat, central Gaza, and three male hostages in another building about 200 yards away: Almog Meir Jan, Andrei Kozlov and Shlomi Ziv.
The Gazan families residing in the apartments were present there, together with the Hamas captors and their prisoners, Hagari said.
Raiding only one building would alert captors at the other location, so the Israelis decided to raid both buildings simultaneously, he said.
The Israeli police’s counter-terrorist unit Yamam trained for the raid on models of the two buildings, Hagari said. The unit reached central Gaza from Israel, he said, denying rumors that it had arrived via a U.S.-built pier designed for aid delivery.
Hagari declined to say whether the officers were disguised as Palestinian civilians, a tactic that Israeli special forces have previously used.
Once the order to proceed was given, the Israeli air force struck a pre-planned list of Hamas targets in Nuseirat, creating cover for the rescue raid. Ground forces from Israel’s Paratroopers Division stood ready to support the operation.
The Yamam commandos reached the apartment entrances undetected, the families of the hostages told Israeli TV later.
One Yamam team stormed the first-floor apartment where Argamani was held and took the captors by surprise, according to the military.
On the third floor of the other building, a gunfight with the guards broke out. The Yamam squad leader, Arnon Zamora, was hit and later died of his wounds.
But the hostages were alive. “We have the diamonds in our hands,” the commandos radioed to the command center.
Leaving the buildings, the teams came under fire from Hamas fighters armed with rocket-propelled grenades, said Hagari. He accused Hamas of deliberately firing at the Israelis from streets full of civilians.
Israeli airstrikes and ground forces hit the militants. The many dead likely included both fighters and bystanders.
Video footage shared by the military showed a CH-35 Sea Stallion helicopter loading soldiers and hostages before whisking them off the beach. Tears and relief awaited them in Israel. In Gaza, more anger and smoldering rubble.
– Abeer Ayyoub and Gordon Lubold contributed to this article.
The Wall Street Journal
