The Israeli military said its troops yesterday rescued four Israeli hostages alive from Gaza after a “complex daytime operation.”
The army named the rescued hostages as Noa Argamani, 26, Almog Meir Jan, 22, Andrey Kozlov, 27, and Shlomi Ziv, 41.
All four were kidnapped by Hamas militants from the Nova music festival on Oct. 7 last year, the military said in a statement, adding that the four had been taken to hospital and were in a “good medical condition.”
Photo: Reuters
Argamani had been one of the most widely recognized hostages after being abducted from a music festival in southern Israel. The video of her abduction was among the first to surface, with Argamani detained between two men on a motorcycle as she screamed: “Don’t kill me.”
Her mother, Liora, has stage four brain cancer and in April released a video pleading to see her daughter before she dies.
An elated Argamani spoke by phone with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Photo: AFP
In an audio message released by the government, Netanyahu is heard asking how she is feeling.
She told him she is “very excited,” saying she has not heard Hebrew in so long.
Israeli army spokesman Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari said the operation took place in two separate buildings “in the heart of a civilian neighborhood.”
“While under fire inside the buildings, under fire on the way out from Gaza, our forces rescued our hostages,” Hagari said in a televised statement.
An Israeli soldier was “critically wounded” in the operation, which took place at about 11am, he added.
“The message this morning to Hamas is clear: We are determined to bring back home all the hostages.”
Meanwhile, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres plans to tell the US Security Council next week that Israel and Hamas are violating children’s rights and leaving them exposed to danger in their war to eliminate each other.
The secretary-general annually makes a global list of states and militias that are menacing children and threatening them. Parties on the list have ranged from the Kachin Independence Army in Myanmar to Russia during its war with Ukraine.
Guterres must send the list to the Security Council and the council then decides whether to take action.
The US is one of five veto-wielding permanent council members and has been reluctant to act against Israel, its longtime ally.
Another permanent member is Russia, and when the UN put Russian forces on its blacklist last year for killing boys and girls, and attacking schools and hospitals in Ukraine, the council took no action.
The inclusion of Israel this month would likely just put more of a global spotlight on the country’s conduct of the war in Gaza and increase already high tensions in its relationship with the global body.
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