Four Israeli hostages taken by Hamas at the Nova music festival have been rescued alive in the central Gaza Strip, the Israeli military said.
Noa Argamani, 25, Almog Meir Yan, 21, Andri Kozlov, 27, and Shlomi Ziv, 40, were found on Saturday as part of a “complex” daytime operation.
Noa Argamani is the girl from the horrific hostage-taking video of the Oct. 7 kidnapping. The video of her kidnapping was one of the first to be published and widely circulated on social media. In the video, Hamas terrorists grab the girl, put her on a motorcycle and take her to the Gaza Strip amid her cries for help.
Her mother Liora has stage four brain cancer, and in April she posted a video asking to see her daughter before she dies.
Today, Noah met with her father, who has been unsteady with grief the whole time. By happy coincidence, it is the rescued girl's father's birthday today. Israeli President Yitzhak Herzog has already called Noa and congratulated her on her return home.
Now all the freed hostages are in good condition and transferred to Sheba Medical Center Tel ha-Shomer for further medical examination, the Israeli military said.
The rescue comes amid mounting international pressure on Israel to limit civilian bloodshed in the war in the Gaza Strip, which reached its eighth month on Friday.
Israel says more than 130 hostages remain, with about a quarter of them presumed dead, and divisions are deepening over how to bring them home. Saturday's operation was the largest rescue of live hostages since the war began, bringing the total number of captives rescued to seven.
Two men were rescued in February when troops stormed a heavily guarded apartment in a densely populated area of the Gaza Strip. Another woman was rescued after the October attack.
Israeli troops have so far recovered at least 16 bodies of hostages in the Gaza Strip, according to the government.
