When commandos from Israel’s elite Yamam counter-terrorism force launched a daring daytime raid on two homes deep within central Gaza and successfully rescued four hostages who had forcefully been taken across the border on October 7, it was the first time many people would learn of the unit’s existence. 

For years, the operations of Yamam have been shrouded in secrecy. Often, credit for its missions was given to other units. “Up until a few years ago, not many people knew about Yamam’s activities,” a unit source told Fox News Digital. But in the age of smartphones and social media, videos of their operations have spread online. “Today, with social media broadcasting operations in real-time, we understand that the rules of the game have changed,” the source says.

Yamam — Yeḥida Merkazit Meyuḥedet, in Hebrew, or Special Central Unit — was founded in 1974 as a special unit of Israel’s Border Police, with the primary mission to take control of and resolve hostage situations. In this regard, it is similar to the FBI’s Hostage Rescue Team, but because it also is capable of rapid offensive raids, such as the hostage rescue executed in Gaza in June, it is closely aligned with such elite American units as Delta Force and Navy SEALs, with whom they are also said to train and cooperate.

ISRAEL RESCUES HOSTAGE AFTER 325 DAYS IN HAMAS CAPTIVITY

“Yamam is like an aircraft carrier with a wide range of in-house capabilities,” said Zohar Dvir, a retired unit commander, told Fox News Digital. The unit includes specialists like snipers, bomb disposal experts, canine handlers, medics and undercover agents known as “mista’aravim.” “It’s full on ‘Fauda,” Dvir added.

“Yamam equips its personnel with cutting-edge technology,” David Tzur, a retired commander from the group, told Fox News Digital. “The unit serves as a testing ground for innovations, collaborating with civilian and defense industries to refine and replicate technologies for broader use.”

“What sets Yamam apart is their ability to carry out thousands of high-risk operations with exceptional precision,” Dvir explained.

“Yamam is considered one of the most experienced — if not the most experienced — counter-terrorism units globally,” a unit commander speaking on the condition of anonymity, told Fox News Digital. “Because of the realities we face daily, countering terrorist threats in the West Bank, Yamam fighters participate in hundreds of operations each year. After Oct. 7, we joined the fight in Gaza.”

A Race Against Time

Yamam members played a critical role in the recent rescue of four hostages held by Hamas terrorists. (Israel Police Spokesman’s Unit)

As part of a condition of talking to Fox News Digital all current Yamam members withheld their full names due to security considerations.

Intelligence pinpointing the location of the hostages in the densely populated Nuseirat refugee camp had been gathered weeks earlier by Shin Bet, Israel’s internal intelligence service, with the help of American and British drones. “We knew about the situation weeks before,” explains Captain A., a team leader told Fox News Digital. “We received the mission, studied the target, and began our preparations.”

On a Saturday morning, the operatives arrived in civilian trucks at the target locations, which were just a few hundred meters apart. Storming the two locations, they rescued the four hostages. At the first site, Noa Argamani, whose terrified image was seen worldwide as she was shown being taken away on a motorcycle by terrorists from Israel on the morning of October 7, was found. At the second location, they rescued Shlomi Ziv, Andrey Kozlov and Almog Meir.

There was resistance, but “everything went according to plan,” said Deputy Superintendent A, a key figure in the operation. 

Yamam counter-terrorism unit snipers watching out for enemy forces.  (Israel Police Spokesman’s Unit)

The team faced a particularly challenging situation at Argamani’s location, where they feared one of the terrorists was close to her. “The goal was to get as close to her as quickly as possible, and that’s what we did. We only realized she was alive when A. and D.” — two operatives on the team — “shouted, ‘We have a diamond! We have a diamond!’ Once we confirmed she was with us, our priority was to get her out safely,” Sgt. Major Y. recounts.

Operatives shielded Argamani with their bodies as they moved her to safety under heavy fire. “She was barefoot, so D. carried her on his back. She was terrified and couldn’t believe what was happening, even when we told her, ‘We’re here to take you home,’” A. told Fox News Digital.

Chief Inspector Arnon Zmora was killed during the raid.  (IDF)

While Argamani’s rescue went smoothly, the situation at the second apartment was far more complicated. As the team entered, they faced “very effective” fire. In the ensuing battle, the team’s commander, Arnon Zmora, was critically injured. “Everything happened very quickly. It was a matter of seconds,” recalls Captain A.  

As with the rescue of Argamani, the team shielded the hostages with their body armor and helmets as they evacuated them under fire. “The area was like a hornets’ nest, packed with militants inside and outside,” A. says. “We quickly moved [the hostages] towards the military vehicles, all the while taking effective fire from within the apartment and its surrounding.”

Yamam troops conducting a weekend rescue operation in the Gaza Strip while under heavy fire.  (IDF)

Though the hostages were rescued unharmed, the end of the mission was tragic for the members of the Yamam team. “We saved the hostages, but we lost one of our own,” one of the fighters told Fox Digital News, speaking of Arnon Zmora, a 36-year-old father of two young boys. “But this is both our privilege and our duty,” he said. “We’ll fight until the last soldier, no matter the cost.”

“While these operations are heroic, they create the illusion that military pressure alone will free the hostages,” said Tzur.  “If there’s an operational window for a rescue, we should take it, but ultimately, we’ll need to make a tough and ugly deal. On October 7th, we were caught off guard, and now we’re forced to negotiate with the devil. Only a deal can bring the hostages back alive,” he said.

The Nuseirat raid was the third time Yamam was involved in the rescue of hostages kidnapped by Hamas, including that of Private Ori Megidish, an Israel Defense Forces (IDF) lookout held captive in the Gaza Strip, and Fernando Marman, 60, and Louis Har, 70, who were held in Rafah. 

Yamam counter-terror unit troops somewhere in Israel. (Israel Police Spokesman’s Unit)

As one of Israel’s most elite forces — its operations are often authorized at the highest levels, including the Prime Minister’s Office — the unit’s fighters generally are older than conscripts in the IDF, and they have already experienced intense combat during their service in the IDF. 

When Hamas attacked Israel on October 7, YAMAM operatives were the first to respond to the unfolding crisis, fighting across 15 different locations that day, including a 27-hour-long battle against Hamas’s elite Nukba force at the police station in Sderot, an Israeli city adjacent to the northern border with Gaza. Nine Yamam fighters were killed in that fight. 

Noa Argamani, 26, Almog Meir Jan, 22, Shlomi Ziv, 41, and Andrey Kozlov, 27, were rescued in two separate locations in a complex special daytime operation in the heart of Nuseirat in central Gaza. (IDF)

“They prevented the advance of Hamas’ elite forces northward, stopping them at Yad Mordechai and neutralizing many of them. The team, led by Arnon Zmora, halted their progress towards Ashdod, Ashkelon, and even as far as Tel Aviv,” said Dvir and added, “they eliminated more than 200 terrorists.”

“We fight for two reasons,” said G., a Yamam fighter who was in the Sderot battle. “One is the desire to destroy the enemy and to be the first to engage them. But much stronger than that,” he says, “is the desire to save lives.”

Apollo Quiboloy, an ally of ex-President Duterte, is facing child sex trafficking charges in the Philippines and the US.

An influential Filipino pastor charged with sex trafficking who had been a longtime ally of former Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte has been arrested by authorities, the government said.

Department of Interior Secretary Benhur Abalos announced the arrest of Apollo Quiboloy in a brief social media post on Sunday. He did not say where the pastor was arrested.

But the self-proclaimed “owner of the universe” and “appointed son of God” was believed to be hiding in a bunker at a sprawling compound owned by his church, the Kingdom of Jesus Christ (KOJC), in the southern city of Davao, Duterte’s stronghold.

In a press conference, Nicolas Torre, regional police director in Davao, confirmed the arrest of Quiboloy. He said he was informed that Quiboloy surrendered to authorities.

In June this year, the Philippine Department of Justice charged the pastor with sex abuse prompting a court to issue his arrest warrant. Five other members of his church were also charged with qualified human trafficking and other acts of child abuse.

Earlier on Sunday, the government deployed at least 3,000 police officers to the church compound, where authorities have been conducting an operation for the last two weeks.

Duterte and his allies had criticised attempts by large numbers of police to arrest Quiboloy as an overkill.

When he was mayor of Davao City, and later as president, Duterte frequently appeared on Quiboloy’s television station to promote his police-enforced drug crackdowns, which left thousands of mostly poor suspects dead.

The pastor said his situation in the Philippines “got complicated” after President Ferdinand Marcos Jr came to power in 2022.

He alleged that Marcos’s government had “conspired” with the agencies in the United States – FBI and CIA – to “hand me over to the Americans”.

Quiboloy had earlier demanded a guarantee from the government in exchange for his surrender that he would not be extradited.

He said if his demands were met, he “will appear and deal with all those cases, no matter where you bring them, here in the Philippines”.

In 2021, the US Department of Justice charged Quiboloy with sex trafficking of girls and women aged 12 to 25 to work as personal assistants, or “pastorals”, who were allegedly required to have sex with him.

JERUSALEM (AP) — Three people were shot and killed Sunday at the border crossing between the West Bank and Jordan, Israeli officials said.

The military said the gunman approached the Allenby Bridge Crossing from the Jordanian side in a truck and opened fire at Israeli security forces, who killed the assailant in a shootout. It said the three people killed were Israeli civilians.

Israel’s Magen David Adom rescue service said the three men who were killed were in their 50s.

There was no immediate comment from Jordan, which made peace with Israel in 1994 but is fiercely critical of its policies toward the Palestinians. The Allenby crossing is mainly used by Israelis, Palestinians and international tourists.

The Israeli-occupied West Bank has seen a surge of violence since Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack out of Gaza triggered the war there. Israel has launched near-daily military arrest raids into dense Palestinian residential areas, and there has also been a rise in settler violence and Palestinian attacks on Israelis.

In Gaza, meanwhile, an Israeli airstrike early Sunday killed five people, including two women, two children and a senior official in the Civil Defense — first responders who operate under the Hamas-run government.

The Civil Defense said the strike targeted the home of its deputy director for north Gaza, Mohammed Morsi, in the urban Jabaliya refugee camp.

There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military. The army says it tries to avoid harming civilians and only targets militants.

Gaza’s Health Ministry says over 40,000 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since the war erupted 11 months ago. It does not differentiate between fighters and civilians in its count. The war has caused vast destruction and displaced around 90% of Gaza’s population of 2.3 million, often multiple times.

Hamas-led militants killed some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, in the Oct. 7 attack on Israel. They abducted another 250, and are still holding around 100 of them after releasing most of the rest in exchange for Palestinians imprisoned by Israel during a weeklong cease-fire last November. Around a third of the remaining hostages inside Gaza are believed to be dead.

The United States, Qatar and Egypt have spent months trying to broker a cease-fire and the return of the hostages, but the negotiations have repeatedly bogged down.

The Palestinian Health Ministry in the West Bank says at least 691 Palestinians have been killed there since the start of the war. Most appear to have been militants killed during Israeli military operations, but the toll also includes civilian bystanders and rock-throwing protesters.

Israel captured the West Bank, Gaza and east Jerusalem — territories the Palestinians want for a future state — in the 1967 Mideast war. Israel withdrew soldiers and settlers from Gaza in 2005 but maintained control over its airspace, coastline and most of its land crossings. Along with Egypt, it imposed a blockade on Gaza after Hamas seized power from rival Palestinian forces in 2007.

___

Follow AP’s war coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/israel-hamas-war