Rescuers resume search for man missing after shark attack at Hadera beach

Searches were renewed on Tuesday morning for a man who was attacked by a shark a day earlier off the coast of Hadera, after they were paused overnight.

Police, the Nature and Parks Authority, the Fire and Rescue service, the army, medics, and volunteers were conducting the search of the area.

The Hadera Stream Beach remained closed as of Tuesday morning.

Rescuers are doubtful the man will be found alive, after beachgoers witnessed the attack and called for aid.

People on the beach filmed the incident on cellphones. One man could be heard exclaiming, “Wow, wow, he’s with the shark, he’s fighting him,” as the man was seen in the distance. “They’re eating him, eating the man… Can’t see him.”

A beachgoer who called the emergency services told them, “There’s someone here that a shark has bitten. He’s screaming, ‘Help!’ He’s in the sea at Hadera. He’s drowning.” Then she added, “He’s in the sea. Nobody’s coming to save him.”

Graphic video taken from the beach showed the attack:

דיווחים דרמטיים על צוללן שננשך ככה"נ על ידי כריש בחוף הים בחדרה. בנתיים הבחור לא נמצא. חיפושים כעת בחוף. ואווו pic.twitter.com/DfbABlFuj1

— שלמה ⛈️ מזג אוויר (@MezgAvirIL) April 21, 2025

The incident took place in an area of the beach where swimming was already prohibited.

It would be just the third recorded shark attack in Israel, according to Yigael Ben-Ari, head of the Parks and Nature Authority’s marine ranger force. One person was killed in an attack in the 1940s.

The area, where warm water released by a nearby power plant flows into the sea, has for years attracted dozens of sharks between the months of October and May. Ben-Ari said swimming is prohibited in the area, but swimmers enter the water anyway.

He said it was unknown how the man believed to have been attacked behaved around the sharks, but the public had a responsibility to recognize that it shouldn’t enter the waters and definitely should not touch or play with the sharks.

One video shared by Israeli media showed a shark swimming right up to bathers in thigh-deep water.

“What a huge shark!” the man filming exclaims, as the shark approaches him. “Whoa! He’s coming toward us!”

“Don’t move!” he implores a boy standing nearby, who replies, “I’m leaving.”

The man then asks, “What, are you afraid of the sharks?”

עובר לילדים בין הרגלים, אין מילים????‍♂️ pic.twitter.com/pegTwKYak8

— שלמה ⛈️ מזג אוויר (@MezgAvirIL) April 21, 2025

The behavior, some of which was witnessed by an Associated Press photographer two days before the attack, flew in the face of the Parks and Nature Authority’s advice not to approach the sharks.

A friend of the missing man told the Ynet news site Tuesday that he warned him not to enter the water: “And then, I received the bitter news.”

“We’ve known each other for more than 20 years and hang out together. In another two months, my son is getting married, and I told him, ‘You’ll be the first person I invite. You are my brother.’ He was supposed to travel to Thailand, and I told him to wait, and we’ll go together after the wedding.”

Eliran Ovadia, an experienced diving guide, told Ynet the sharks are known to gather in the water, but that Monday’s incident was “unusual.”

“For 13 years, we have been diving there with groups, and sharks swim by us freely at a distance of 10 centimeters, half a meter. They ignored us, sometimes they were a bit curious, but they never opened their mouths and tried to attack,” Ovadia said.

“Sharks don’t know how to differentiate between the hand that feeds them and the food itself,” he noted.

Uri Pizanti, a diving equipment business owner, told Ynet that rumors spread Monday that he was the shark attack victim, and that he received some 400 messages from loved ones checking in to see whether he was safe. He said he had no idea how his name had become associated with the attack.

“The incident is still being investigated. I hope they find the missing man. Sharks are wild animals, and this is a rare case,” he said.

Dusky and sandbar sharks, which frequent the area during the period between November and May, are not known to attack humans.

Over the past few days, fish die-offs in the Hadera Stream and the nearby Alexander Stream have attracted sharks to the shores of Hadera and Beit Yannai. The sharks eat dead, sick, and wounded fish as they enter the sea, helping keep natural waters clean.

The Society for the Protection of Nature in Israel said Monday it had recommended four years ago that the waters frequented by sharks be closed to fishing, as well as limiting motorized vessel access and defining a viewing area that allows the sharks to move freely and humans to view them safely.

“It would have been appropriate to take steps to preserve and regulate public safety, but over the years, chaos has developed in the area,” the statement read.

It said fishermen, boats, divers, surfers, and snorkelers intersected dangerously with a wild animal that “is not accustomed to being around crowds of people.”

Sue Surkes, Charlie Summers and AP contributed to this report.