Where is 8 Yo Girl Doha Talat, last taken by the IDF near the Rafah crossing late July.
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On August 30, we uncovered an Instagram post by Ido Zahar, a soldier from Israel's 432nd Tzabar Battalion. One of his pictures, featured a photo of himself with a young girl in Gaza with no one from her families seen. Following the post's deletion and turning his account into private. We delved into a further investigation about the details of the incident.
We were unable to independently verify the identity of the girl in Ido Zahar's post and relied on a soldier's testimony and the details he provided to establish her identity. Name: Doha Talat, 8 year old girl taken by the Israeli military near Rafah crossing in late July. We reached out to the Israeli military for comment and to inquire about what happened to Doha. The military stated that they are checking into the incident.
We reached out to Zahar with an interview request who didn’t want this story posted. "No story. No face. No nothing. Please delete this completely from everywhere” he told us.
Reports from Gaza have stated that hundreds of children are missing since the war started on October 7th. On December 31, Israel’s military radio broadcasted an interview with Shahar Mendelson, a friend of the late Israeli military Captain Harel Itah. Mendelson stred that Itah “had a good heart” thad once he rescued a crying baby in Gaza and brought her back to Israel. The tweet was later deleted by Israel’s military radio.
Further coverage on the story was reported in Israel’s largest newspaper, Yediot Ahronot. The Palestinian foreign ministry back then called for an immediate investigation, suggesting that the incident might constitute a serious war crime.
Two days later, a military spokesman dismissed the allegations, stating that claims about an Israeli soldier abducting a baby girl were unfounded. However, a report by Save the Children, titled “The Missing Children of Gaza,” estimated that thousands of children are missing in Gaza, including what the organization describes as "detained, disappeared, or abducted.". The UN Human Rights Council, in a press release from May, reported numerous cases of women and girls from Gaza being forcibly disappeared by the Israeli military.
We contacted a soldier from the 432nd Battalion, directly involved in the incident, who requested anonymity. The soldier “I” recounted that he participated in an operation near the Rafah crossing in late July.
The military was conducting house raids when an elderly man and a young girl, identified as 8-year-old Douha Talat, emerged from one of the houses with their hands raised.
The soldier alleged that the elderly man from own discretion offered to show the soldiers tunnel shafts in the area near the crossing. “I” stated that he separated the girl from her elderly family member for "safety reasons," claiming concerns that the tunnels might be booby-trapped. However, this reasoning appears flawed, given that he stated the elderly man allegedly offered them to show them tunnel shafts which would put him in danger.
The testimony revealed additional interesting inconsistencies. according to the soldiers involved. The elderly man, who was supposedly offering from his own discretion to show the soldiers tunnel shafts, turned out to have shown them sewer shafts . The soldier claimed that the Shin Bet later accused him of being affiliated with Hamas and relaying information on their operations. A controversial accusation that seems unfounded and contradictory, especially considering that the man was initially said to have volunteered to reveal tunnel locations and that they did not know before that he was Hamas.
The soldier alleged that the elderly man was taken into custody as a result of the incident but declined to provide further details about his identity or whereabouts to cross reference with his alleged affiliation ->>
“I wasn't there anymore, because I was watching over the girl, but from what I understood, it turned out to be a sewer shaft that he took them to. After a check by the Shin Bet, it was revealed that the man was involved with Hamas and was observing us to relay information on where we were operating so they could attack us.” “I” commented.
This claim raises doubts about whether he was genuinely offering help which isn’t reasonable only to be accused of Hamas and arrested or was being used as a human shield, as documented in similar cases reported by Israeli newspaper Haaretz and Al Jazeera.
The incident occurred in late July near the Rafah crossing, an area where the Israeli military continues to operate to this day.
The soldier said that after spending a time with 8-year-old Duha, he and his colleagues handed her over to other soldiers. “I don't know what happened to her, I left them at some point. She is 8 years old from Rafah”. She was left without any family members, and he does not know where the other soldiers took her to.
We believe it is in the public interest to know the whereabouts and safety of this girl. We will update this story as soon as new details become available. We also urge any relevant authorities to provide more information about the missing girl based on the details.
Mike