Israeli MIAs explained

Israeli MIA are members of the Israel Defense Forces who are missing in action. Despite efforts to locate and repatriate them, their whereabouts remain unknown. Every year, a state ceremony is held at Mount Herzl, Israel's military cemetery in Jerusalem.^[1]

IDF prisoners of war

In the Yom Kippur War 301 Israelis were captured by Syria and Egypt, 232 of whom by the Egyptians, 65 by the Syrians and 4 by the Lebanese. The majority of them were captured in the first stage of that war. Some Israeli soldiers reported after their release about the difficult conditions they faced: they were severely beaten by their captors, sometimes making them unconscious, while many reported that they were being investigated under torture.^[2]

Known Israeli MIAs

• Members of the 362th battalion declared missing after the Battle of Sultan Yacoub in Lebanon on June 12, 1982: Zechariah Baumel (body recovered in 2019),^[3] Tzvi Feldman, and Yehuda Katz.^{[4] [5]}
• Ron Arad, an IDF F-4 Phantom II navigator, was lost over Lebanon on October 16, 1986.^[4]
• Guy Hever disappeared on duty in the Golan Heights on August 17, 1997.^[4]

Procedure and guidelines

According to Reuben Yardor, a military intelligence leader of the Yom Kippur War, the automatic assumption they made was that all that's known to their captured soldiers is also known to the captors.^[6]

Several publicized stories of Israeli prisoners of war were:^[7]

• Corporal Uri Ilan, undercover soldier in the Golani Brigade who committed suicide in a Syrian prison in 1955, leaving a note in which he wrote, "I did not betray."
• Lieutenant Colonel Avi Nir, fighter pilot shot down and captured during the Yom Kippur War, died in captivity without revealing secrets to his captors. He was posthumously awarded the Medal of Courage, for "[He] was tortured to death by investigators but revealed no information. Doing so demonstrates loyalty and supreme sacrifice."^[8]
• Lieutenant Amos Levinberg, intelligence officer taken captive by the Syrians in the beginning the Yom Kippur War, and gave his captors a lot of information. He was eventually released in a prisoner exchange.^[9]

See also

• Gilad Shalit
• Disappearance of Ron Arad
• Majdi Halabi
• List of Israeli prisoner exchanges

Further reading

• Kaplan. Danny. Commemorating a suspended death: Missing soldiers and national solidarity in Israel . American Ethnologist . Wiley-Blackwell . 35 . 3 . July 31, 2008 . 0094-0496 . 10.1111/j.1548-1425.2008.00043.x . 413–427.
• Public Law 106–89 106th Congress, US Congress, November 8, 1999
• Book: Alexander Bligh. Israeli Prisoner of War Policies: From the 1949 Armistice to the 2006 Kidnappings. 16 March 2017. Lexington Books. 978-0-7391-9472-0.

External links

• EITAN - Missing in Action Accounting Unit of the IDF
• ICMIS Home Page: The International Coalition for Missing Israeli Soldiers

Notes and References

1. Web site: Simmons . Rabbi Shraga . Missing in Action . aishcom . October 16, 1986 . April 2, 2018.
2. Web site: 11 October 2012. Israel's MIAs. Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs. August 20, 2013.
3. https://www.jpost.com/Breaking-News/After-37-years-the-body-of-SgtZachary-Baumel-has-returned-to-Israel-585650 AFTER 37 YEARS, THE BODY OF SGT. ZACHARY BAUMEL HAS RETURNED TO ISRAEL
4. Web site: Kaplan. Danny. Commemorating a Suspended Death: Missing Soldiers and National Solidarity in Israel. American Ethnologist Volume 35, Number 3 (August 2008). 18 October 2011 . 0094-0496. dead. https://web.archive.org/web/20120317004813/http://www.dannykaplan.org/articles/SuspendedDeathCirculatePrePublication.pdf. 17 March 2012.
5. Web site: Fischer . Elli . Yehuda, Tzvi, and Zachary: MIA for 30 Years . The Times of Israel . August 30, 2017 . April 2, 2018.
6. Web site: Dalia Gavriely. Israel's Cultural Code of Captivity and the Personal Stories of Yom Kippur War Ex-POWs. Sage Journals. August 20, 2013.
7. Web site: November 8, 1999. Public Law- An Act. August 20, 2013.
8. (The source is in Hebrew)
9. Web site: Bergman . Ronen . The Spies Inside Damascus . Foreign Policy . September 20, 2013 . April 2, 2018.