Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at an annual ceremony at the Yad LaBanim memorial in Jerusalem, on April 29, 2025. (Credit: Abir Sultan/AFP)
Israel announced Sunday that it had recovered the body of a soldier killed in Lebanon in 1982 during a "special operation" conducted "in the heart of Syria."
"During a special operation carried out by the Israeli army and Mossad (the foreign intelligence service), the body of Sgt. Zvika Feldman was located in the heart of Syria and brought back to Israel," the military and Mossad said in a joint statement.
Feldman — whose full name was Zvi, with Zvika as his nickname — was killed during the Battle of Sultan Yaqoub, a confrontation between Israeli and Syrian forces that took place June 10-11, 1982, in Lebanon’s eastern Bekaa Valley near the Syrian border. His body had never been found.
"The return of Sgt. Feldman's body was made possible by a complex and clandestine operation, enabled by precise intelligence and the use of operational capabilities that demonstrated ingenuity and courage," the statement said. No details were given about when the operation took place or the exact location where Feldman's remains were discovered.
The Israeli military confirmed Feldman’s identity through genetic testing. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visited Feldman’s family to personally inform them of the recovery.
Three Israeli soldiers went missing following the battle of Sultan Yaqoub. The body of Zachary Baumel, commander of the 362nd armored battalion, was repatriated in April 2019. A third soldier, Yehouda Katz, remains missing.
“We will not stop acting to bring him back,” Netanyahu said in a statement. “For many years, I have authorized numerous secret operations to find the missing from Sultan Yaqoub.”
With Feldman's return, the Israeli military’s unit for missing persons still lists three soldiers whose fate is unknown: Katz; aviator Ron Arad, captured during a mission over Lebanon in 1986; and Guy Hever, who disappeared on the Golan Heights in 1997. The unit continues to search for dozens of other soldiers officially declared dead, including one killed in Gaza in 2014.
“The return of all missing and captive individuals, alive or dead, is our moral and national duty,” Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said in a statement.
The announcement comes as 58 of the 251 hostages taken during Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, assault on southern Israel remain in captivity in the Gaza Strip.
“We cannot, as a society, normalize a situation where families must wait more than 40 years to recover their loved ones,” the Hostage Families Forum said in a statement.
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