Yamam, also known as National Counter-Terrorism Unit, is Israel's national counter-terrorism unit, one of four special units of the Israel Border Police. The Yamam is capable of both hostage-rescue operations and offensive take-over raids against terrorist targets in civilian areas. Besides military and counter-terrorism duties, it also performs tactical unit duties and undercover police work.
The abduction and killing of Nachshon Wachsman was a 1994 incident in which Palestinian Hamas abducted Israeli soldier Nachshon Wachsman from the Bnei Atarot junction in central Israel, and held him hostage for six days. The incident ended in a failed Israeli rescue attempt, during which Wachsman, three of his captors and an Israeli officer were killed.
The 1974 Beit She'an attack, which took place during 19 November 1974, was a raid by a squad of three Palestinian militants, belonging to the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine militant organization, on the Israeli city of Beit She'an.
The Hannibal Directive is the name of a controversial procedure that was used by Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) until 2016 to prevent the capture of Israeli soldiers by enemy forces. According to one version, it says that "the kidnapping must be stopped by all means, even at the price of striking and harming our own forces." It was introduced in 1986, after a number of abductions of IDF soldiers in Lebanon and subsequent controversial prisoner exchanges. The full text of the directive was never published, and until 2003, Israeli military censorship forbade any discussion of the subject in the press. The directive has been changed several times, until it was officially revoked in 2016 by IDF chief of staff Gadi Eizenkot. The Directive's replacement has not been published.
The 2012 Israeli operation in the Gaza Strip was a military operation carried out in the Gaza Strip by the Israel Defense Forces starting on 14 November 2012, following rocket attacks on Israeli territory launched from Gaza during the preceding days.
On 7 October 2023, Hamas and several other Palestinian militant groups launched coordinated armed incursions from the Gaza Strip into the Gaza envelope of southern Israel, the first invasion of Israeli territory since the 1948 Arab–Israeli War. Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups named the attacks Operation Al-Aqsa Flood, while in Israel they are referred to as Black Saturday or the Simchat Torah Massacre, and internationally as the 7 October attack. The attacks consequently started the ongoing Israel–Hamas war.
The battle of Sderot began on 7 October 2023, when Hamas launched a large-scale surprise attack on southern Israel, which was widely condemned as an act of terrorism. The Israeli town of Sderot, located close to the border between Israel and the Gaza Strip, has frequently been the target of rocket attacks and incursions during the course of the Gaza–Israel conflict. Hamas militants massacred at least 50 civilians and 20 police officers.
On 7 October 2023, in the opening attacks of the 2023 Hamas-led attack on Israel, Hamas militants carried out a massacre at Be'eri, an Israeli kibbutz near the Gaza Strip.
On 7 October 2023, as part of the Hamas-led attack on Israel at the beginning of the Israel–Hamas war, Hamas and other Palestinian militant groups abducted 252 people from Israel to the Gaza Strip, including children, women, and elderly people. In addition to hostages with only Israeli citizenship, almost half of the hostages are foreign nationals or have multiple citizenships. Some hostages were Negev Bedouins. The precise ratio of soldiers and civilians among the captives is unknown. The captives are likely being held in different locations in the Gaza Strip.
On 7 October 2023, as part of the surprise attack on Israel, Palestinian militants from the Gaza Strip, led by Hamas, invaded the Nir Oz kibbutz in southern Israel. They killed scores of kibbutz residents, burned homes, and abducted civilians. According to the Israeli military, up to 150 militants participated in the massacre.
On 7 October 2023, the Hamas Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades attacked Holit, a kibbutz close to the border fence with the Gaza Strip, as part of a surprise attack on Israel.
On October 7, 2023, as part of the 2023 Hamas-led attack on Israel, a series of coordinated armed incursions into the Gaza envelope, around 30 Hamas militants attacked Kibbutz Sufa and then overran a nearby military outpost.
On 7 October 2023, the Hamas Nuseirat Battalion attacked Nir Yitzhak, a kibbutz close to the border fence with the Gaza Strip, as part of a surprise attack on Israel.
Women in the Israel–Hamas war refers to the experience of Israeli and Palestinian women as victims of violence, combatants, leadership partners, and as participants in informational campaigns during the Israel–Hamas war. The conflict has been marked by violence towards women, including reports of rape and sexual violence by Hamas militants and reports of rape and sexual violence by IDF soldiers. Following the Hamas-led attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, there were testimonies and videos indicating that Hamas employed methods of severe torture, including violence and sexual violence against Israeli women and children. Over 100 Israeli women were taken hostage and held in Gaza, leading to efforts by Israeli women and organizations to raise awareness and promote their release. The UN Secretary-General and UN Women condemned the gender-based violence against Israeli women during the attacks.
During the 2023 Hamas-led attack on Israel, Israeli women and girls were reportedly subject to sexual violence, including rape and sexual assault by Hamas or other Gazan militants. The militants involved in the attack are accused of having committed acts of gender-based violence, war crimes and crimes against humanity. Hamas has denied that its fighters committed rape and assault against women. During the 7 October attacks by Hamas on Israeli communities, Israeli women and girls were reportedly raped, assaulted, and mutilated by Hamas militants, an allegation that Hamas denies. Israeli police said dozens of women and some men were raped. The New York Times and the BBC reported that "videos of naked and bloodied women filmed by Hamas on the day of the attack, and photographs of bodies taken at the sites afterwards, suggest that women were sexually targeted by their attackers".
The 2023 Israel–Hamas war led to an intensive interrogation program by Israeli intelligence agencies, particularly Israel's domestic security agency, Shin Bet and IDF's Unit 504, targeting captured Hamas militants. Following the surprise Hamas attack on October 7, which resulted in approximately 1,200 Israeli casualties, mostly civilian, more than 600 militants were captured in Israel. Israel has claimed that the interrogation of the suspects revealed significant insights into the group's strategies, ideologies, and operational methods that played a crucial role in Israel's military response and in shaping the global understanding of the conflict.
The kidnapping of Yarden Roman-Gat occurred during the 2023 Hamas-led attack on Israel and the subsequent Gaza Strip hostage crisis. Yarden Roman-Gat, a 36-year-old woman who is a dual national of Germany and Israel, along with her husband Alon and their 3-year-old daughter Gefen, were abducted by Hamas militants from their home in Kibbutz Be'eri on October 7, 2023, during the Be'eri massacre, and taken towards the Gaza Strip border. Yarden's act of self-sacrifice in saving her daughter during their escape attempt, and her subsequent two-month-long captivity in Gaza, garnered significant attention and an international campaign to release her and other hostages held in Gaza.
On 7 October 2023, 21-year-old French-Israeli woman Mia Schem was abducted by Hamas during the Re'im music festival massacre, part of the 2023 Hamas attack on Israel. Her abduction, a video of her in captivity in Gaza, and subsequent release on 30 November garnered international media attention, and she became a face of the hostage crisis during the Israel–Hamas war.
Operation Golden Hand was an IDF operation in cooperation with the Shin Bet and Yamam for the rescue of two hostages who were kidnapped to Rafah during the Nir Yitzhak attack on 7 October, 2023. The operation commenced on February 12, 2024, at 1:49 AM during combat in the Gaza Strip during the Israel–Hamas war, and ended successfully with the rescue of the hostages, along with a soldier who was lightly injured during the operation. The coordinated early morning airstrikes that were used as cover for the operation reportedly caused the deaths of at least 94 Palestinians according to the Gaza Health Ministry, which does not distinguish between military and civilian casualties.
Naama Levy is an Israeli soldier serving in the Israel Defence Forces (IDF). On the morning of 7 October 2023, during the Hamas attack on Israel, terrorists abducted her from the IDF surveillance base at Nahal Oz near the Gaza–Israel barrier.
