Yousef Al-Ziyadnah, 53, who was kidnapped during the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, was found dead in a tunnel in the Rafah area, a statement from the Israel Defense Forces said. The IDF said he had been “killed in captivity” and confirmed that the dead bodies of at least two Hamas operatives were found nearby.

A boy looks on, on the day friends and family gather at the family home of Youssef Ziyadne and his son Hamza Ziyadne, Bedouin Israeli hostages seized during the deadly October 7 attack by Hamas, in Rahat, southern Israel, January 9, 2025. REUTERS/Ammar Awad

The Israeli military said Wednesday that its troops recovered the body of a hostage in Gaza and brought it back to Israel following a "complex and difficult operation".Military spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Nadav Shoshani said in an online briefing that troops carried out what he described as a "complex and difficult special operation" to retrieve the body.