Israeli mother and daughter found in Argentina

In a case that gripped Israel and brought in Interpol, Mossad and the Israeli police, mother and daughter Mali and Liel Yahalomi were found alive and well in Argentina on Friday, after going missing for a week.

Two weeks ago the pair, said to have been religiously observant, were reported missing by their family in Israel. Speculation online included kidnapping, terrorism, and even murder.

They had gone to Austria, the family said, to celebrate Mali’s 50th birthday, in a trip organised by 23-year-old Liel. During their time in Vienna, they sent regular pictures and updates about their travel, and it was only when the messages stopped that the family raised the alarm. The women had failed to turn up for a Shabbat meal at Chabad in Vienna, or for check-in for their booked return flight home.

Now, however, Israeli media reports suggest that the disappearance had been meticulously planned more than a month before their arrival in Vienna, and that many of the tourism pictures sent to their family in Israel had been taken long before they left the Austrian capital.

The Israeli police officer who spoke to the pair on an inter-city bus in Argentina, Walter Kogan, appeared satisfied that no criminal activity was involved and that the Yahalomis simply wanted to leave Israel.

Mali Yahalomi is said to have withdrawn a large sum of money — around £12,500 — before she and her daughter left Israel. Since she was a senior employee at the Bank of Jerusalem, many unsubstantiated rumours circulated on social media, leading to a brief drop in the bank’s market value. The bank was forced to issue a statement saying nothing had been taken from its funds.

Media reports in Israel say that the mother and daughter had begun planning their departure about a month ago and had asked Gemini, Google’s AI chatbot, for advice about how to move to another location without being traced.

Though mystery still surrounds the motivation behind their disappearance, the Kan public broadcaster reported that police had been able to trace them through their chatbot history.

It now appears that after leaving Vienna, the two stopped in the Czech Republic and Germany before flying to South America. Upon arriving in Prague, they sent their family a video they had taken in Vienna. Then they turned off their phones, and began using new phones purchased in Prague.

In their discussion with Kogan, according to Israel’s Channel 12 news, the women said: “We simply want to disconnect from the family, from the country.” He asked the women if they had been threatened or were subject to blackmail and they denied such suggestions. When he asked if they had left Israel because of debts, they responded: “No. We just want to leave everything.” Mali Yahalomi, who is understood to be divorced, has a son — who remains in Israel —as well as her daughter.

Before they were discovered alive and well, family members had launched a crowdfunding campaign which raised around $100,000 to help pay for independent investigation of their mysterious disappearance. Now the campaign has been discontinued and the family has apologised and pledged to return donations this week.