Israel rejoices as hostage is reunited with family - editorial

It was a video clip that couldn’t help but bring one to tears. Splashed throughout social media Tuesday afternoon, it showed family members of Qaid Farhan Alkadi racing through the corridors of Soroka Medical Center in Beersheba to reunite with their loved one, who had been rescued that morning from a Gaza tunnel in another daringly successful operation by Israel’s security forces.

Alkadi, a 52-year-old Bedouin father of 11 from Rahat, had been held captive by Hamas since October 7 when he was taken hostage by the terror group from his security job at Kibbutz Magen. Now 326 days later and 15 kilos lighter, he was a free man.

The emotions displayed in the video, and in the photos of Alkadi’s brother, Hatem, beaming next to him in the hospital, are something that all Israelis can easily identify with, after so many harrowing months of anguish and uncertainty over the fate of the 108 hostages still unaccounted for in Gaza.

Who couldn’t relate to the statement of Alkadi’s brother, who told reporters that seeing Qaid again was “better than having a new child.”

The joy and jubilation that the Alkadi family was feeling reverberated to the entire country, as exemplified by another social media clip (broadcast on N12) showing a Haifa lifeguard announcing the rescue over his intercom, and the entire beach of bathers breaking out in whoops and cheers.

It was so natural and uncontrived, something worth remembering and emphasizing. Israel – the Jewish state with its Jewish army, put life and limb at risk to locate and rescue a Bedouin Muslim, who ironically was held in captivity by fellow Muslims.

In a world where Israel is regularly being accused of perpetrating genocide against a Muslim population, this must not only be mentioned, but shouted out loudly.

President Isaac Herzog called the rescue of Alkadi “a moment of joy for the State of Israel and Israeli society as a whole,” while Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu wrote: “The entire people of Israel was moved by his being freed.”

Just as we applauded and cried with joy with the Bedouin population of Israel upon Alkadi’s rescue, we grieved with the Druze families of the children from Majdal Shams, who were murdered in a rocket attack by Hezbollah last month.

If the Gaza war has resulted in anything positive at all, perhaps it’s a new inclusive sense of what it means to be Israeli. Hamas didn’t distinguish between Jew, Muslim, Bedouin, Druze, or Christian when it launched its brutal attack on October 7. And since then, in turn, Israelis have been color blind and religion blind both in their country’s efforts to rescue hostages and in its battle against Hamas and Hezbollah. IDF troops consisting of soldiers from all of these and other cultures fighting side by side for the same goal – of living freely and securely in their own country.

The challenge is to take that unity and camaraderie out of the crisis situation and integrate it as part of everyday life in Israel, where fear and suspicion of the “other” still runs rampant, and discrimination against minorities is still widespread.

Second class citizens

Most non-Jewish residents of Israel feel like second-class citizens and face uphill battles in all facets of society. That must change – and maybe, just maybe, we’re beginning to see a new realization that the other is really us.

The rescue of Qaid Farhan Alkadi represented the best of Israel – where coexistence is a reality, and where an army of predominantly Jewish soldiers carries out a dangerous operation and risks their lives to rescue a Bedouin Muslim – a fellow Israeli.

Let’s strive to use that example in our everyday lives and try to remember that the things that unite us are far stronger and durable than the things that separate us.

May we soon collectively break out in spontaneous and joyous celebration again when Hamas finally agrees to a ceasefire deal and the remaining 108 hostages are brought home. Until then, the rescue of Alkadi and his reunion with his family will remain the spark that fuels our hopes.