Israel says hostage captured by Hamas on October 7 was freed in ‘complex operation’ by troops in Gaza

Jerusalem — The Israeli military announced Tuesday that it had rescued one of dozens of people kidnapped in the Oct. 7 Hamas attack that sparked the ongoing civil war. war in GazaThe army said Qaid Farhan Alkadi was rescued “during a complex operation in the southern Gaza Strip.”

Israeli Army Radio said Alkadi was the first hostage troops managed to find and rescue alive from inside the building. Hamas’s vast tunnel network In Gaza, three previous operations freed hostages who were being held in buildings above ground, the channel said, later adding that Alkadi was found alone inside the tunnel by troops, with no other abductees or militants.

Army Radio, which is government-owned but editorially independent, said there was no fighting in the rescue operation because there was “no resistance from the terrorists,” which it said could be because he escaped his captors, or his captors fled amid the ongoing military operation in the area.

Alkadi, 52, is from Israel’s Bedouin Arab minority and worked as a guard at a packing plant in Kibbutz Magen, one of several farming communities that were attacked on October 7. He has two wives and is the father of 11 children.

Israeli Channel 12 showed Alkadi’s family members rushing to the hospital where he had been taken after receiving the news.

Hamas-led militants abducted about 250 people in the October 7 attack, in which some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, were killed.

The Israeli retaliatory offensive has left more than 40,000 Palestinians dead, according to health officials in the Hamas-controlled territory, who do not distinguish between civilians and combatants. The war has displaced 90 percent of Gaza’s 2.3 million people from their homes and caused widespread destruction across the besieged territory.

Hamas still holds about 110 hostages, a third of whom are believed to be dead. Most of the others were released in exchange for Palestinians imprisoned by Israel during last November’s ceasefire.

Israel rescued a total of eight hostages, including two from prison. operations that killed dozens of PalestiniansHamas says several hostages were killed in Israeli airstrikes and failed rescue attempts.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu issued a statement Tuesday congratulating the Israeli military and intelligence services “on another successful liberation operation,” adding that his administration would continue to work “tirelessly to return all of our kidnapped people.”

He said these efforts would include both “negotiations and liberation operations,” which “would require our military presence on the ground and relentless military pressure on Hamas.”

The United States, Egypt and Qatar have been trying for months to negotiate a deal that would release the remaining hostages in exchange for a lasting ceasefire. last round of these talksTalks in Cairo over the weekend did not appear to make much progress, but Israel said it remained committed to dialogue.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has faced heavy criticism from the hostages’ families and much of the Israeli public for not yet reaching an agreement with Hamas to repatriate them.