by Israeli security forces said early Monday that they had freed two hostages being held in the southern Gaza city of Rafah, in only the second known rescue of its kind in Gaza since the start of the war. Gaza officials said accompanying Israeli strikes had killed dozens of Palestinians in the city overnight.
The hostages, Fernando Simon Marman, 60, and Louis Har, 70, were undergoing tests at a hospital near Tel Aviv and were both in good condition, according to a joint statement from the Israeli army, police and the internal security agency, Shin Apuesta.
“Fernando and Louis, welcome home,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a statement. “I congratulate our brave fighters for the bold action that led to their release.”
Netanyahu’s office said Marman and Har had dual citizenship of Israel and Argentina. They were among more than 240 people captured during the Oct. 7 surprise attack in southern Israel by Hamas and other militant groups. Israel said it launched attacks in Rafah to cover the rescue.
The two men, emaciated but not visibly injured, cried and hugged their relatives who had come to join them at Sheba Medical Center, according to a video released by the Israeli military.
Har was pale and “a little in shock,” according to Idan Berjerano, his son-in-law, who visited him and spoke to Israel’s public broadcaster.
The Israeli military said Marman and Har had been kidnapped from the same house in Nir Yitzhak, a kibbutz near the Gaza border. They were taken hostage along with other family members, including Clara Marman, Mr. Marman’s sister and Mr. Har’s partner. Ms. Marman and the other family members were freed in November as part of a week-long ceasefire between Israel and Hamas.
An Israeli news website, Ynet, reported that the two men had told their captors they were Argentine and had tried to strike up a conversation by talking about soccer.
The rescue was the main story in the Israeli media, but public reaction seemed more muted than in November, when around 100 hostages were freed during the ceasefire. This appeared to reflect in part the knowledge that more than 100 people remained in captivity.
“We will not stop until everyone returns home,” said the organization Bring Them Home Now, which advocates for the release of the hostages. saying in a post on social media.
Last week, The New York Times reported that Israeli intelligence officials had concluded that at least 30 of the remaining 136 hostages had been killed since the start of the war.
Before Monday, Israeli forces had said they had rescued at least one hostage, Pvt. Ori Megidish, who was freed during a military operation in October. But the military has released few details about that operation.
In December, the Israeli military said its forces had mistakenly killed three hostages in Gaza waving a makeshift white flag.
While military analysts say rescue operations are not the way to free most captives, families of the hostages have been pressing Israel to prioritize negotiations for their release. Last week, Netanyahu publicly rejected Hamas’s latest proposal for another pause in fighting that would allow the release of some of the hostages held by the militants. But Israeli officials have also signaled that his government was still open to negotiation.
Asked in a televised interview Sunday with ABC News how many of the remaining hostages were still alive, Netanyahu said: “Enough to justify the kind of efforts we are making.”
President Javier Milei of Argentina, who last week made his first state visit to Israel as president, thanked the Israeli military for rescuing the two men. In a sentence On Monday, Milei’s office said he had raised the issue of the Argentine hostages in his meetings with Israeli leaders.
The report was contributed by Gabby Sobelman, Myra Noveck and Cassandra Vinograd.
