Missing Soldier Guy Hever Not Holed Up in Rahat Institution, After All

The latest lead in the case of missing soldier Guy Hever has turned out to be a false one, the IDF said in a statement Monday. The statement came after a report Sunday night that IDF soldiers raided a home for the mentally challenged in the Bedouin town of Rahat, following up on a lead that Hever could be in the home.

Channel One news reported Sunday that evidence and rumors had led soldiers to the home, investigating the possibility that a resident of the home was actually Hever. According to the report, the army had “solid information” that the unidentified individual was actually Hever. The report did not say how Hever might have ended up there.

The army conducted a thorough investigation, but in the end it determined that the individual was not Hever, the army said. In its statement, the army said that “the IDF is constantly engaged in trying to solve the riddle of the disappearance of Hever, and will continue to do so until he is found.”

So far, there has been no credible claim of kidnapping by any group, indicating that the former is probably the case, IDF officials have said. In 2007, a Syrian terror group called The Resistance Committees for the Release of the Golan Heights claimed to be holding Hever, but the group did not offer any evidence of the by-then 10-year-old case, the first time it had made such a claim.