(JTA) — An Arab-Israeli man attacked by a mob in the Negev town of Kiryat Gat after being mistaken for a terrorist met with the Jewish man who rescued him.

Eyal Haddad and Salem, the Bedouin from the Negev that Haddad saved Saturday from a crowd who thought he was a terrorist, visited with one another while Salem was recovering at Barzilai Hospital in Ashkelon, the Times of Israel reported.

Haddad got between Salem and a crowd of people attacking him because they wrongly thought he was the terrorist who had stabbed four people outside a soccer stadium Saturday night, causing moderate injuries.

The mob hit Salem, an Israel Defense Forces veteran, and stabbed him several times, before Haddad intervened.

“They threw a cement block at my head and stabbed me nine times, my body is covered in stab wounds. I wouldn’t be alive if not for him,” Salem told Israel Channel 2 news.

“I told them I wasn’t a terrorist but they kept going. These people would have done it to anyone, whoever they found on the street, they’d kill him,” he said.

Police said they are searching for Salem’s attackers.

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