IDF soldiers have completed the sealing of the underground tunnel in which LT Hadar Goldin, was held. Goldin was killed in battle in the Gaza Strip and abducted on August 1st, 2014, during Operation Protective Edge.
Thanks to the sustained effort and operations of the IDF in Gaza, LT Hadar Goldin, was returned for burial in Israel as part of the framework for the return of hostages in November 2025.
In an operation by the IDF Southern Command, involving the Yahalom Unit and Shayetet 13, IDF troops located the underground tunnel in southern Rafah where LT Hadar Goldin had been held in recent years. Over the past three months, engineering troops from the Gaza Division and the Southern Command, together with the Yahalom combat engineering special forces unit, worked to seal the tunnel, which stretches for more than 16 kilometers (about 10 miles). The operation used more than 30,000 cubic meters of concrete, and has now been completed.
The tunnel complex included approximately 80 living quarters and served as a Hamas terrorist organization’s command-and-control center. It was also used by the Commander of Hamas’s Rafah Brigade in its military wing to plan and advance terrorist operations. The tunnel was located near the Philadelphi Corridor and ran beneath a residential neighborhood, mosques, kindergartens, clinics, a school, and a UNRWA clinic.