Disappearance of Guy Hever

Guy Hever (Template:Langx; born 30 May 1977) is an Israeli MIA. Hever, a soldier in the Israeli Army, has been missing since 17 August 1997. He was last seen on his army base at 9:30 AM on the Golan Heights, dressed in his army fatigues, carrying his weapon, a Galil AR, his dog tag and his international military identification papers (Geneva Convention Card). The area was searched thoroughly, but to this day his whereabouts are unknown.

Biography

Guy Hever was born in Nahariya, Israel to Rina and Eitan Hever.Template:Citation needed

Disappearance

Hever had previously been sentenced to 21 days confinement for falling asleep during guard duty. On Saturday night, Hever was tasked with placing stickers on crates of supplies, an order he refused to carry out, and accordingly received a court martial summoning for insubordination. On Sunday morning, he finished his guard duty at 9:15 AM and was last seen at 9:30 AM buying a can of Coca-Cola, still in his uniform and with rifle in hand, then leaving the base without permission. He was never seen again after this.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>

The original IDF investigation surmised that he had gone AWOL and had subsequently committed suicide, citing his upcoming courtmartial and a history of previous clashes with commanding officers.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> Both the military and the police searched for him, including with divers, dogs, robots and aircraft, but no trace of his body or weapon was ever found.<ref name="toi1">Template:Cite news</ref> They refused to classify Hever as a missing soldier for three years.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref name="toi1" /> His mother however was convinced from the beginning that her son was kidnapped by Syrian forces, although the Syrian government consistently ignored overtures from former US president Jimmy Carter,<ref>Missing soldier's photo delivered to Assad Template:Webarchive, YNET, Roni Sofer, 22 April 2008</ref><ref>Carter, Jimmy. "My Study Trip to the Middle East." Israel Journal of Foreign Affairs 2.2 (2008): 117-123.</ref> former Israeli and Syrian US ambassador Edward Djerejian and agents from the German Federal Intelligence Service.<ref name="toi1" />

On the day of his disappearance, a birdwatcher reported seeing a figure in military fatigues on the border, although this report is considered unreliable.<ref name="jpost">Template:Cite news</ref> Several months later, a woman living near the army base said that she saw someone matching his description walking towards the Syrian border, and a German woman wrote to Hever's mother in 2005 claiming to have seen Hever being interrogated in Damascus. She had previously alerted the IDF of this, but had been ignored.<ref name="toi1" />

On 13 February 2007, a Syrian organization calling itself "The Resistance Committees for the Release of the Golan Heights" claimed to be holding Hever.<ref>Template:Cite newsTemplate:Dead link</ref> The credibility of the statement is in doubt, since it came ten years after Hever's disappearance. Army officials said at the time that the IDF was investigating the claim, although it stated that this was not the first time that an organization claimed to have Hever in captivity.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>

In July 2009, Rina Hever said that she met with Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The premier pledged that a special point-man would be named to oversee the activity undertaken by the various defense agencies in the state in finding her missing son.

In August 2009, Rina Hever also met with Israel's Foreign Ministry director general Yossi Gal. The mother, who in the past sought the ministry's aid in finding her son yet was only accorded limited cooperation, requested that the government seriously broach the matter with the Syrians via an intermediary.

In the end of July 2009, Israel launched a quiet diplomatic campaign in an attempt to ascertain the whereabouts of Hever. Israel passed a message along to Syria via Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov in which Jerusalem communicated its desire to obtain any information that Syria may possess on Hever. While it is not clear if the soldier is in Syria, the move represents a significant change in Israel's official policy in the case. The goal of the campaign is to determine whether Syria can provide information on Hever's fate.<ref>Haaretz. 'Israel asks Syria for info on missing IDF soldier' by Barak Ravid. Template:Webarchive Last accessed: 12 August 2009.</ref>

In 2011, the IDF appointed a high-ranking officer to liaise between Hever's family and the security services.<ref name="toi1" />

In 2014, the IDF resumed the search for Hever, torching two minefields near the base in order to see if any of the explosions were unusual, although no discovery was made.<ref name="toi2">Template:Cite news</ref>

In 2015, the IDF searched reservoirs in case Hever had drowned, but again to no avail.<ref name="toi2" />

In 2016, the IDF made another search, this time on land, but found no trace of Hever.<ref name="jpost" /> The army also followed up on a lead from a psychic medium,<ref>In search for MIA soldier, army checks lead from psychic Template:Webarchive, Times of Israel, 10 November 2016</ref> and found human remains and clothes of a different individual in the Golan.<ref>Report: IDF finds biological remains, clothes in search for missing soldier Template:Webarchive, Times of Israel, 11 November 2016.</ref>

In 2017, the IDF raided a home for the mentally ill in the southern city of Rahat following a report than Hever was being kept there, but subsequently determined he was not there.<ref>Israel follows up on false tip missing soldier was at a mental health clinic Template:Webarchive, Times of Israel, Judah Ari Gross, 27 November 2017</ref>

Interest in the case

The Hever case has received significantly more attention that other missing person cases, including missing soldiers, and his name is often incorporated into the mission statements of NGOs focused on missing soldiers. According to anthropologist Dr. Danny Kaplan this is due to a number of factors: his role as a combat soldier, the social status of his family, and officials entertaining the possibility of Hever crossing over to Syria that has made it easier to add Hever to the more "valued" group of soldiers that are missing behind enemy lines.<ref>Kaplan, Danny. "Commemorating a suspended death: Missing soldiers and national solidarity in Israel." American Ethnologist 35.3 (2008): 413-427.Template:Dead linkTemplate:Cbignore</ref>

See also

• List of people who disappeared

External links

• Homepage dedicated to Guy Hever
• Website built by the Hever Family
• Foundation offering a 10 million dollars reward for information leading to Guy Hever
• Israeli Foreign Ministry article on Hever
• The International Coalition for Missing Israeli Soldiers (ICMIS) ICMIS has closed down due to lack of funds, and the website has not been updated since July 2005."