Al Mayadeen English

  • Ar
  • Es
  • x
Al Mayadeen English

Slogan

  • News
    • Politics
    • Economy
    • Sports
    • Arts&Culture
    • Health
    • Miscellaneous
    • Technology
    • Environment
  • Articles
    • Opinion
    • Analysis
    • Blog
    • Features
  • Videos
    • NewsFeed
    • Video Features
    • Explainers
    • TV
    • Digital Series
  • Infographs
  • In Pictures
  • • LIVE
News
  • Politics
  • Economy
  • Sports
  • Arts&Culture
  • Health
  • Miscellaneous
  • Technology
  • Environment
Articles
  • Opinion
  • Analysis
  • Blog
  • Features
Videos
  • NewsFeed
  • Video Features
  • Explainers
  • TV
  • Digital Series
Infographs
In Pictures
  • Africa
  • Asia
  • Asia-Pacific
  • Europe
  • Latin America
  • MENA
  • Palestine
  • US & Canada
BREAKING
Israeli media: Direct damage from Iranian bombing of "Israel" in one week is estimated at approximately 5 billion shekels (about $1.35 billion)
Unprovoked aggression against Iran has no basis or justification: Putin
Shahid Beheshti University Public Relations: The Israeli aggression targeted a building belonging to Shahid Beheshti University with the aim of sabotaging Iran's cultural and scientific infrastructure
Al Mayadeen correspondent: The Fordow nuclear facility was bombed once again, 24 hours after the US aggression.
Fars News Agency, citing informed sources: The Iranian Armed Forces used the Kheibar-Shekan, Emad, Ghadr, and Fattah missiles in their attacks on the Israeli entity today
Sirens sound from the occupied Golan Heights to Akka and Nahariya
Sirens sound again in the occupied Golan Heights and al-Jalil
Israeli media: Power outages reported in several settlements following a missile attack targeting an infrastructure facility
Israeli media: Strategic location in the south likely hit
Israeli media outlet: Reports of missiles falling in at least 7 areas, including Askalan, Safad, and Isdud

Israeli fibs: What really happened when two captives were retrieved?

  • By Al Mayadeen English
  • Source: Al Mayadeen Net
  • 16 Feb 2024 20:31
  • 12 Shares
6 Min Read

The truth behind the Israeli narrative of the IOF retrieving two captives from Rafah: the reality of events that led to their release.

  • x
  • Israeli captives Louis Har (70) and Fernando Simon Marman (60)
    Israeli captives Louis Har (70) and Fernando Simon Marman (60)

The Israeli occupation forces claimed on Monday that during a joint operation with Shin Bet and the Israeli Police, they were able to retrieve two Israeli captives held in Rafah by the Palestinian Resistance in Gaza, while simultaneously massacring over 100 Palestinian civilians and injuring tens of others. 

Following the retrieval of the captives, Israeli media and journalists narrated a web of tales praising the heroic but complex success of the operation, while Israeli generals and officials celebrated the accomplishment. 

However, as leads to the narrative did not add up, two major questions were raised:

What happened during the Israeli operation? And were the two Israelis actually held captive by the Resistance? 

Reliable sources revealed to Al Mayadeen the chronology of events of the operation on February 12, exposing the fallacy of the Israeli narrative as nothing more than an unraveling fictitious charade that unveils the severity of "Israel's" turmoil and signifies just another tale added to the collection of lies the occupation has spread since October 7. 

A Fabricated Charade

On October 7, after the destruction of the separation fence in Gaza, the collapse of Israeli defenses, military bases, and sites, and the Palestinian Resistance's captivation of Israeli occupation soldiers, Palestinian civilians mobilized to Israeli settlements near the envelope and kidnapped settlers rendering the Resistance factions' tallying process more difficult and less accurate.

The Resistance could not measure the tangible ramifications that unfolded immediately, especially amid the launching of intense and constant Israeli airstrikes, targeting the entirety of the Gaza Strip.

Taking this into consideration, members of a well-known family in Rafah kidnapped two Israeli settlers, Fernando Simon Marman (60) and Louis Har (70), who would later be claimed to have been retrieved by the IOF. 

Related News

One Israeli soldier killed, another wounded in Gaza clashes

Israeli forces kill Palestinian after West Bank checkpoint shooting

The captives were taken to a house in Rafah, where the leader of the family clan had put them under the protection of his brother and cousins. They were tasked with providing them with food and the necessary medical care. To preserve their protection, the members had been moving them from location to location, while "Israel" carried out its military offensive in Gaza. 

However, when the leader was martyred in Khan Younis in January, the three members became the sole protectors of the captives, with no responsible director available to refer to. Therefore, the clan acted on their own diligence and continued moving Marman and Har, the Israeli captives, until they finally settled in a house in the Shaboura refugee camp, according to Al Mayadeen's sources. 

Since the members acted on their own will and were independent of an organized association, Louis Har, one of the captives, was able to manipulate the members and bribe them with an escape out of Gaza and provide them with whatever requests they made, alleging that his daughter owned a giant Israeli company that would be able to cement his promises. The Palestinian men were eventually convinced and called Har's daughter. 

Har's daughter then established a channel of communication with the three men and constantly conducted calls that were monitored by Israeli intelligence. To further gain their trust, Har's daughter sent the three men's relatives in London and Sweden monetary sums and offered that they accompany the captives back to the occupied territories, claiming she would guarantee their safety, information obtained by Al Mayadeen's sources revealed. 

However, her offer was rejected, but a deal was made by which the woman would give the members an already-agreed-on monetary sum in exchange for the release of the captives, and a promise that the men could escape Gaza to Egypt, then to a European country.

Terms of the deal

Al Mayadeen's sources detailed that the deal brokered between the men and the captive's daughter, tailored and monitored by the Israeli occupation intelligence forces, included the transportation of the captives to the vicinity of the Gaza envelope, where Har's daughter claimed would be stationed at a location hidden from Israeli occupation forces. 

As per the deal, one of the men was supposed to go to a location in Rafah's vicinity, after it was besieged from all sides, to meet the captive's daughter and obtain the sum. Once that was done, his relatives would be called to confirm the acquisition of the money, and to greenlight their move to another location where the captives would be released after he leaves with the money. 

Three dates were set to complete the deal, however, the captive's daughter would call ahead of time to delay based on personal security concerns and fears, until one last definitive date would be set on February 12 at 1 a.m.

A deception operation 

🇵🇸 #Palestine - 🇮🇱 #Israel: Helmet camera footage from the Israeli hostage rescue operation in Gaza’s Rafah area on Monday morning has been published. The footage shows operatives from the Yamam counterterrorism unit breaching a building where they soon after discovered hostages… pic.twitter.com/Z9svz6g4lT

— POPULAR FRONT (@PopularFront_) February 14, 2024

When the first man arrived at the agreed location to meet the captive's daughter, the brutal Israeli military operation was launched in Rafah, after Israeli intelligence, through monitoring the calls, pinpointed the location of the house where Har and Marman were being held and the number of people residing there. 

In an act of deception, the Israeli military operation targeted all sides of Rafah, except the near vicinity of the house. Israeli occupation soldiers then went into the house and retrieved the captives. The man who had left to meet the captive's daughter is speculated to have been either detained or killed, which rebuts the Israeli claims of concocting a "secret" operation that led them to the house where the captives had been and "the confrontation against armed men inside the apartment and neighboring buildings throughout the operation."

Therefore, based on the obtained information, the occupation deliberated the fabrication of a "complex and cohesive operation" to falsely promote a major accomplishment for the feeble occupation "army" that has failed to retrieve one single captive in its four-month and still ongoing military offensive on Gaza. It also served to polish Benjamin Netanyahu's image as settlers and captives' families protested against him and his policies, specifically after several settlers were killed by reckless and vicious IOF bombing in Gaza. 

  • IOF
  • Israel
  • Rafah
  • Israeli occupation
  • Palestinian resistance
  • Gaza
  • Israeli captives
War on Gaza

War on Gaza

Most Read

Iran launches 9th wave of Op. True Promise 3, destroys IOF air defense

Iran launches 9th wave of Op. True Promise 3, destroys IOF air defense

  • MENA
  • 17 Jun 2025
Rescue team work at the site where a missile launched from Iran struck Tel Aviv, Israel, Monday, June 16, 2025 (AP)

Wave 12 of Operation True Promise 3 launched, Sejjil deployed: IRGC

  • Politics
  • 18 Jun 2025
Israeli workers survey the site where a missile launched from Iran struck in Haifa on Sunday, June 22, 2025. (AP)

True Promise 3, wave 20: 40 missiles launched, Kheibar-Shekan in first

  • Politics
  • 22 Jun 2025
Iran launches missile barrage to Tel Aviv, casualties reported

True Promise 3, wave 14: Tel Aviv targeted, casualties reported

  • Politics
  • 19 Jun 2025

Coverage

All
The Ummah's Martyrs

Read Next

All
Secretary of Iran's Supreme National Security Council Ali Shamkhani, speaks with then-Syrian Prime Minister Imad Khamis in a meeting in Tehran, Iran, Tuesday, January 17, 2017 (AP)
Politics

Iran holds the initiative after nuclear strikes, Shamkhani says

Blood stains a religious painting inside Mar Elias Church, where a suicide bomber detonated himself in al-Dwela, on the outskirts of Damascus, Syria, on Sunday, June 22, 2025 (AP)
Politics

UN, regional governments condemn Damascus church bombing

A B-2 bomber arrives at Whiteman Air Force Base Missouri, Sunday, June 22, 2025, after returning from a massive strike on Iranian nuclear sites on Saturday (AP)
Politics

Israeli media: US-Israeli strike on Iran failed to end war

China UN Ambassador Fu Cong addresses the United Nations Security Council, Monday, March 24, 2025. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)
Politics

China slam US strikes on Iran nuclear sites

Al Mayadeen English

Al Mayadeen is an Arab Independent Media Satellite Channel.

All Rights Reserved

  • x
  • Privacy Policy
  • About Us
  • Contact Us
  • Authors
Android
iOS