Israeli forces have killed the militant filmed abducting Noa Argamani on a motorcycle during the October 7 attack on the Nova Music Festival, military officials announced Sunday.
Saher Nidal Latfi Sakr, 29, died in an operation carried out by the IDF’s undercover Gideonim Unit 33 in the Nuseirat area of central Gaza, according to the Israeli Defense Forces. The unit located Sakr after months of intelligence work targeting figures involved in the mass kidnappings that day.
Sakr was the man seen in the widely circulated footage from October 7 cheering as he sped away from the festival grounds with Argamani, then 25, clinging to the motorcycle and screaming for her boyfriend, Avinatan Or. The clip became one of the defining images of the Hamas-led assault, which killed nearly 380 people at the outdoor dance event alone.
The IDF accused Sakr of being “an operative in global Jihad organizations who provided, among other things, combat means for the Hamas terror organization during the war.” Beyond his role in Argamani’s abduction, officials said he supplied weapons to Hamas and helped coordinate attacks against both troops and Israeli civilians during the ongoing conflict.
Sakr had reportedly embedded with Hamas and Palestinian extremist groups during the October 7 invasion, joining the assault on the festival where he participated in the mass kidnappings. Israeli intelligence tracked his movements in Gaza before the targeted operation in Nuseirat.
The announcement of Sakr’s death came alongside confirmation that another high-profile militant, Hamas commander Muhammad Hamad Muhammad Gabain, was also killed in a separate airstrike in northern Gaza. Gabain had been involved in holding nine hostages abducted on October 7: Ziv Berman, Eitan Mor, Liri Albag, Agam Berger, Matan Engerst, Gali Berman, Omri Miran, Keith Siegel, and Alon Ohel.
“The terrorist was eliminated from the air in order to remove the threat he posed,” the Israeli military said in a statement regarding Gabain’s killing. The IDF added that Gabain had been working to coordinate terror attacks against Israeli forces and had helped “rehabilitate the capabilities of the Hamas terror organization” during cease-fire periods.
Gabain was operating in northern Gaza when the airstrike targeting Hamas bases and personnel took him out, according to military officials. His death and Sakr’s killing were announced jointly by the IDF and Israel’s Shin Bet intelligence agency.
Argamani survived eight months in Hamas captivity before a dramatic rescue operation in June 2024 extracted her and three other hostages from a Nuseirat refugee camp compound. The mission brought her home to Israel just weeks before her mother, Liora Argamani, died of brain cancer at age 61. Noa had been able to visit her mother in her final days after the rescue.
The rescue operation that freed Argamani, along with Almog Meir Jan, Andrey Kozlov, and Shlomi Ziv, was one of the most complex hostage extractions of the war, involving IDF special forces, air support, and intelligence cooperation. All four hostages were reported in good medical condition upon their return to Israel, though Argamani later recounted being disguised as a Palestinian woman during her captivity and facing a near-lynching by a Gaza mob during the rescue.
Argamani and Or, who had also been taken hostage, were reunited after both gained freedom. Or was released in a November 2023 hostage deal after 54 days in captivity, while Argamani remained imprisoned until the June rescue.