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Statement by PM Netanyahu

Israel - Prime Minister's Office

Media Statements
The 37th Government
11.05.2025

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu:

"In a special Mossad and IDF operation, we have returned home the body of Sgt. First Class Tzvi Feldman, who fell in the Battle of Sultan Yacob in June 1982 during the First Lebanon War.

For decades Tzvika has been missing and the efforts to locate him, as well as the other MIAs from the same battle, have not ceased.

Approximately six years ago, we returned for a Jewish burial, Sgt. First Class Zecharia Baumel; today we have returned Tzvika, of blessed memory. We will not cease our efforts to return Sgt. First Class Yehuda Katz, who is also an MIA from the same battle.

For many years, I have approved many secret operations to locate the MIAs from Sultan Yacoub, and I promised the Feldman family that I would not stop taking action to bring Tzvi back home.

The dear parents, Pnina and Avraham did not cease their efforts on the issue; unfortunately they have passed on. We return dear Tzvika to you - Itzik, Shlomo and Anat - to you and to the soil of the Land of Israel the he so loved.

I would like to thank the Mossad, the IDF, the ISA and Coordinator for the Hostages and the Missing, Brig.-Gen. (Res.) Gal Hirsch, for decades of determined and courageous efforts of the highest order to return Tzvika and all of our missing and our hostages, the living and the deceased alike.

The State of Israel and the Government of Israel under my leadership are fully committed to this.

In the words of the prophet Jeremiah (31:16; https://mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt1131.htm?v=fa603a5d05): 'There is hope for the future says the Lord, and your children shall return to their own border.'"

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu went to the Feldman family home in Tel Aviv, together with his Military Secretary and the Coordinator for the Hostages and the Missing, to personally inform the family about the return to Israel of Sgt. First Class Tzvika Feldman, of blessed memory, after having been missing, for 43 years, from the Battle of Sultan Yacoub in the First Lebanon War.