A canine who went lacking for 40 days after the phobia assaults towards Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, is now offering consolation to a number of folks in a exceptional flip of occasions.
Rebecca Geller, a British-Israeli lady who lives in Tel Aviv, Israel, instructed Fox Information Digital that she awoke in a panic on Oct. 7, 2023, at 4:40 a.m. after having a nightmare about her “angelic” five-year-old rescue canine, Stevie.
On the time, Geller was in London, visiting family and friends. In her dream, Stevie had been bitten by a scorpion and was “within the desert, dying alone.”
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She described how, the night time earlier than as effectively, she had a horrible dream that her canine had drowned.
Geller mentioned she instantly texted her buddy, Dana Avesar, who was caring for Stevie along with her boyfriend at his caravan in Talmei Yosef, a southern village in Israel, to seek out out if her canine was OK. In the meantime, she noticed a message from one other buddy that mentioned, “Israel is beneath assault. You’d higher delay your flight house.”
![Rebecca, Yoram and Stevie](https://a57.foxnews.com/static.foxnews.com/foxnews.com/content/uploads/2024/06/1200/675/bb2e4bc9-dog-split.jpg?ve=1&tl=1)
Stevie the rescue canine, who went lacking after the phobia assaults of Oct. 7, 2023 in southern Israel, is proven at left. At proper, Rebecca Geller and Stevie, together with Yoram Erez, founding father of Preserving the Rights of Animals (PTROA), a nonprofit group, on June 21, 2024. (Rebecca Geller)
Geller had been scheduled to fly again to Israel the subsequent day.
She mentioned that about an hour later, her buddy texted her that there have been sirens going off and loud booms — and that Stevie was lacking.
“I spotted they have been in big hazard.”
Avisar mentioned she heard rumors {that a} group of canine have been seen leaving the village collectively. She and her boyfriend went out to search for Stevie a number of instances, she additionally mentioned — however now it was too harmful.
“I didn’t know what to do with myself,” Geller recalled to Fox Information Digital. “I used to be principally attempting to remain calm, and I used to be attempting to not drive them loopy as a result of I spotted they have been in big hazard.”
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Geller mentioned she messaged everybody she knew from southern Israel, and realized that, thankfully, they have been OK.
She began posting photos and movies of Stevie on social media on daily basis, drawing consideration to a singular characteristic of his – a tiny, naturally grown mohawk on the highest of his head, which she calls his “fortunate tuft.”
![Stevie and twin Billie](https://a57.foxnews.com/static.foxnews.com/foxnews.com/content/uploads/2024/06/1200/675/Stevie-and-twin-Billie-.jpg?ve=1&tl=1)
Stevie, on the fitting, is proven along with his twin, Billie, at left. Rebecca Geller looked for her lacking canine Stevie for over a month. (Rebecca Geller)
Geller mentioned her buddy provided to search for Stevie, and that’s when she realized she wanted to seek for him herself. She instructed her mom in London that she was sorry, however she needed to go.
Her mom pleaded along with her to not go — however “after all I didn’t pay attention,” Geller mentioned.
‘It was scary’
On Oct. 31, 2023, Geller traveled to southern Israel along with her cousin and an armed volunteer from Paw Support, previously referred to as Canine & Heroes, an Israeli volunteer group that rescues and rehabilitates pets from conflict zones and pure disasters.
Greater than 1,000 canine went lacking after Oct. 7 — and roughly 700 of them have been discovered by rescue organizations.
“You wanted navy clearance … and also you wanted to go down with a weapon,” she mentioned.
They mapped out what path to take primarily based on the place the canine had been noticed, and organized for entry to enter the guarded villages and kibbutzim.
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Geller mentioned she left a few of her laundry across the caravan and fields close to the place Stevie had been staying in order that he may decide up her scent.
Geller additionally drove across the space alone.
“I had lots of of posters in these plastic sleeves. I used to be placing them on fuel stations, supermarkets … giving them to troopers, wherever that there was an intersection and a visitors gentle,” she mentioned.
![Aviva Siegel and Stevie](https://a57.foxnews.com/static.foxnews.com/foxnews.com/content/uploads/2024/06/1200/675/Aviva-Siegel-and-Stevie.jpg?ve=1&tl=1)
Aviva Siegel with Stevie. Siegel, 63, is a grandmother who was held hostage for 51 days. She remains to be ready for her husband, Keith, to be launched. (Rebecca Geller)
She described the eeriness of the ambiance. “It was winter and the times have been actually quick, and it was scary to drive round there at night time.”
She mentioned she made positive to keep away from Route 232, a freeway within the Negev desert described by The Instances of Israel as “a hellish panorama stained by blood and hearth.”
After over a month of trying to find Stevie, Geller mentioned that Canine & Heroes related her to Yoram Erez, founding father of Preserving the Rights of Animals (PTROA), a nonprofit group that locates and rescues animals by utilizing navy know-how.
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Erez instructed Fox Information Digital that on Oct. 7, packs of untamed canine entered the kibbutzim in southern Israel from Gaza by the fence, combating with home canine and killing cattle.
He estimated that greater than 1,000 canine went lacking after Oct. 7 — and that roughly 700 of them have been discovered by rescue organizations.
‘Absolute mission to seek out them’
On Nov. 14, 2023, Geller accompanied Erez to the south. She mentioned that Erez was capable of get navy clearance to fly drones over every kibbutz and the village of Talmei Yosef, the place Stevie had been staying.
“He made it his absolute mission to seek out all of the animals,” Geller mentioned.
Geller mentioned she helped Erez feed the cats on the Nir Oz and Kissufim kibbutzim, which have been evacuated after the Hamas massacres. A number of the houses have been decimated, she mentioned, whereas others have been untouched.
![Archaeologists assist the IDF at a burnt home that was nearly destroyed during the Oct. 7 attack by Hamas](https://a57.foxnews.com/static.foxnews.com/foxnews.com/content/uploads/2023/11/1200/675/Israel-attack.jpg?ve=1&tl=1)
Archaeologists with the Israel Antiquities Authority are proven sifting by particles to seek out the stays of victims of the Oct. 7, 2023 assault on Israeli border communities by Hamas. (Israel Antiquities Authority )
“You’re strolling previous a home with a do-it-yourself mosaic path, after which the subsequent home is a burned out shell,” she mentioned.
Geller recalled how painful it was to be there.
“I used to be so shaken up by it. I used to be so unhappy to see how lovely [the homes] have been … The gardens are unimaginable … and the sculptures that the kids made out of used plastic bottles that spin round within the wind … Each single element is stuffed with love.”
“I used to return house and scream.”
She described the individuals who as soon as lived there as “salt of the earth … easy and peaceable.”
Geller mentioned she was heartbroken by the expertise and devastated that they didn’t discover her canine Stevie. “I used to return house and scream,” she mentioned.
Two days later, Geller obtained a telephone name from a soldier stationed within the south, who mentioned that he thought he noticed Stevie due to his mohawk.
‘Don’t let him go wherever’
However many individuals had been calling her by then, Geller mentioned, pondering they’d seen Stevie when it wasn’t him — so “I actually wasn’t excited.”
![Kibbutz Alumim](https://a57.foxnews.com/static.foxnews.com/foxnews.com/content/uploads/2023/11/1200/675/GettyImages-1731583832.jpg?ve=1&tl=1)
Charred particles and objects are scattered inside a constructing in kibbutz Alumim, following the Oct. 7 assault by Hamas terrorists in southern Israel close to the Gaza Strip, on Oct. 18, 2023. (GIL COHEN-MAGEN/AFP through Getty Pictures)
When the soldier despatched her a photograph, Geller mentioned she was in disbelief.
“It’s Stevie!” she exclaimed. “Please simply preserve him the place he’s. And do not let him go wherever.”
Erez mentioned that when he obtained the decision from Geller telling him that Stevie had been discovered, it was already darkish and he was close to Tel Aviv — however he “made a U-turn and rushed over there.”
He noticed “a thin canine, very terrified, very confused.”
Two hours later, Erez reached the Egyptian border, the place he mentioned he noticed “a thin canine, very terrified, very confused.”
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He mentioned he knew the canine was Stevie as a result of when he put Geller on speaker, “he began to cry … He made a squeaky voice, like when a pet is crying.”
Erez mentioned it normally takes two weeks to find a canine — and mentioned Stevie was “very fortunate” to have been discovered after he’d been lacking for 40 days.
![Facetime with Stevie & Mor](https://a57.foxnews.com/static.foxnews.com/foxnews.com/content/uploads/2024/06/1200/675/1116-Facetime-with-Stevie-Mor-.jpg?ve=1&tl=1)
Stevie “began to cry … He made a squeaky voice, like when a pet is crying.” Rebecca Geller is proven on the Facetime video at backside proper. (Rebecca Geller)
Geller waited for Stevie’s arrival in Tel Aviv with three of her girlfriends and their canine, together with Stevie’s twin brother, Billy, who belongs to Geller’s buddy and had been maintaining Geller firm whereas Stevie was lacking.
“I really like his brother … It was actually useful for him to be there with me,” Geller mentioned.
Geller mentioned she stayed on the telephone along with her mom and “was so excited … I used to be simply so nervous. I hadn’t smiled for 40 days … I used to be attempting to feed everybody dinner and I believe I burned all the things!”
He hopped up on his hind legs to latch onto her.
Geller, who’s single, joked for a second, “I can discover a sand-colored canine within the desert, however I can’t discover a man in Tel Aviv.”
Video footage that went viral captured Stevie smiling and excitedly wagging his tail when he noticed Geller. He hopped up on his hind legs to latch onto her, and he or she tearfully exclaimed how glad she was to see him once more. (See the video on the high of this text.)
![Rebecca & Stevie 11:16 night he came home](https://a57.foxnews.com/static.foxnews.com/foxnews.com/content/uploads/2024/06/1200/675/Rebecca-Stevie-1116-night-he-came-home.jpg?ve=1&tl=1)
Geller and Stevie are proven on the night time he got here house. “I used to be like, ‘Oh my God, you’re right here!’” Geller instructed Fox Information Digital in regards to the expertise. (Rebecca Geller)
“I used to be over the moon … He was alive and regular, and remembered me!”
That night time, Geller put Stevie’s new mattress that she had purchased for him in London on high of her mattress. “I simply stored touching him, like each 10 minutes,” she mentioned.
“I used to be like, ‘Oh my God, you’re right here!’ Each time I checked out him, he was taking a look at me.”
‘Wanted to do one thing for these folks’
Geller described how she stored pondering of the ache and trauma the kin of the hostages will need to have been feeling whereas she was on the lookout for Stevie — and nonetheless are feeling.
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“All of the whereas I am on the lookout for Stevie, I am conscious that there are hostages, and I really feel silly for investing a lot vitality in on the lookout for a canine, however on the similar time, Stevie’s my household. I simply knew I wanted to do one thing for these folks.”
She added, “I actually really feel related to them. And I not often inform them as a result of I do not need them to assume that I am minimizing the ache that they are going by for eight months.”
On Dec. 14, 2023, she began volunteering at The Hostages and Lacking Households Discussion board, a corporation based by kin of abductees in Gaza, and he or she now works on the overseas media group.
![Yarkov Argamani and Stevie](https://a57.foxnews.com/static.foxnews.com/foxnews.com/content/uploads/2024/06/1200/675/Yarkov-Argamani-and-Stevie.jpg?ve=1&tl=1)
Yarkov Argamani with Stevie. Argamani’s daughter, Noa, 26, was rescued by the IDF in Rafah in June 2024. Geller mentioned that her canine, who’s offering consolation to others, “is so calm, and he’s simply so current. He additionally has this sort of sensitivity.” (Rebecca Geller)
Geller brings Stevie to the Discussion board’s Tel Aviv workplace along with her on daily basis, the place she mentioned that lots of of kin of hostages, in addition to some launched hostages, have bonded with him.
“I simply really feel like he appears at them, and he offers them a little bit of consolation,” she mentioned. “He is so calm, and he’s simply so current. He additionally has this sort of sensitivity.”
“You’ll be able to see that he has such an excellent coronary heart.”
A textual content about Stevie was forwarded to Fox Information Digital from Aviva Siegel, 63, a grandmother who was held hostage for 51 days. She remains to be ready for her husband, Keith, to be launched from Gaza.
She mentioned of the canine, “I really like him. He’s particular. You’ll be able to see that he has such an excellent coronary heart.”
Itzik Horn, father of hostages Yair and Eitan Horn, additionally expressed his happiness to see Stevie through a textual content message.
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In a video, Udi Inexperienced, cousin of murdered hostage Tal Haimi, whose spouse gave delivery to their fourth son final month, mentioned that being with Stevie was a “little escape” and “even higher than having the psychological well being division of the Discussion board.” (He is the person proven within the second half of the video on the high of this text.)
Yakov Argamani, whose daughter, Noa, 26, was rescued by the IDF in Rafah earlier this month, texted that he realized he had an image with Stevie — and expressed how glad he was to see “this cutie.”