The Israeli military said Tuesday that it rescued hostage Farhan al-Qadi from a tunnel in the Gaza Strip, flying him to a hospital in Israel where he is in stable condition and has reunited with his family, according to his brother and local health officials.
Israeli forces discovered Qadi while searching a tunnel network in southern Gaza, military officials said. He was alone and unguarded when they found him, the officials said, speaking on the condition of anonymity in line with military protocol.
His brother, Hatem al-Qadi, said in a phone interview that he felt “great joy” over his sibling’s release and that he was “in good health.”
“It’s something indescribable,” Hatem al-Qadi said. “It feels as if he came back to life.”
Qadi, a father of 11 and member of Israel’s Bedouin Arab minority, was flown to the Soroka Medical Center in Beer Sheva in southern Israel. He “is fully conscious and in good overall condition,” a spokesperson for the medical center said in a statement early Tuesday. He and a relative reunited with “great emotion” inside the hospital, the statement said.
תמונה ראשונה מבית החולים: אחיו של פרחאן אלקאדי ברגעי הפגישה המאושרים@galdjerassi pic.twitter.com/BnUogsMUE6
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Qadi was one of six Bedouins kidnapped on Oct. 7, according to the office of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. At least 18 were also killed, out of a total death toll of about 1,200 people.
Israel’s Bedouin minority, numbering around 300,000, are the descendants of traditional nomadic communities who carve out life in Israeli territory, hold Israeli citizenship and have extensive familial ties that stretch into Gaza. They are also subject to discrimination and neglect, living in villages and makeshift settlements, mostly in Israel’s Negev desert, that Israeli authorities refuse to recognize.
Qadi, from a village near the majority-Bedouin city of Rahat, was working security at a produce packaging plant near the Gaza border when he was shot and then kidnapped, his brother said, adding that he was treated for his gunshot wound while in captivity.
“He said: ‘The army came and took me,’” Hatem al-Qadi described his brother as saying. “I don’t know many details.”
Israel launched its military campaign on Oct. 7, declaring that its aim was to destroy Hamas. Its strikes have taken a heavy toll on the militant group but have also destroyed Gaza’s infrastructure and displaced 90 percent of the population. More than 40,000 people in Gaza have been killed, according to the Gaza Health Ministry, which does not distinguish between civilians and combatants but says the majority of the dead are women and children.
The military has also sought to dismantle the vast network of tunnels built and managed by Hamas underneath Gaza — a subterranean system the militants use to move undetected, smuggle weapons, hide hostages and attack Israeli troops.
Brig. Gen. Amir Avivi, a reservist officer in the Israel Defense Forces and former deputy commander of the Gaza Division, said Israeli forces have developed new techniques for searching and fighting in the tunnels. At the start of the war, “the overall strategy was not to go into tunnels, but destroy them from the outside,” he said.
On Tuesday, a specialized unit of Israeli naval commandos were “systemically checking tunnels” when they spotted Qadi, Avivi said. “They were not sure whether it was a terrorist or somebody else.”
Qadi was too weak to climb out of the tunnel on his own, according to Avivi. “Luckily they didn’t shoot him,” he said.
Around 100 hostages remain in Gaza, according to Israeli authorities, including about 70 they believe are still alive. The return of the hostages to Israel is a central part of the negotiations to reach a cease-fire deal in Gaza, one that U.S. mediators hope will also halt the fighting, see Israeli troops withdraw from major population centers and usher in the enclave’s reconstruction.
While the United States insists a Gaza cease-fire deal is close, diplomats are skeptical.
But the hostages’ months-long captivity has also served as a flash point for frustration with Netanyahu’s government. Netanyahu spoke with Qadi on the phone Tuesday, according to a statement from the prime minister’s office. Netanyahu told Qadi that “all of the people of Israel are excited about his release,” the statement said.
Some of the families of the hostages and their supporters have led weekly demonstrations demanding the prime minister agree to a deal that would bring their loved ones home.
Qadi’s “return home is nothing short of miraculous,” the Hostages and Missing Families Forum, an umbrella organization for the relatives of hostages, said in a statement. But while the group welcomed his release, it said that “military operations alone cannot free the remaining 108 hostages,” urging political leaders to secure an agreement.
“We are committed to seizing every opportunity to bring the hostages back home,” Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said.
Israeli President Isaac Herzog also said he was “overjoyed” at Qadi’s rescue and released a recording of their phone conversation Tuesday.
“Suddenly, I heard someone speaking Hebrew outside the door” of the tunnel, Qadi said, according to a transcript of the call. “I couldn’t believe it,” he said. “I couldn’t believe it.”
Hassan reported from London, Soroka from Tel Aviv and Morris from Berlin. John Hudson in Tel Aviv and Hazem Balousha in Cairo contributed to this report.
