Hamas returns bodies of 4 Israeli hostages, believed to include mother and her 2 young children

Khan Younis, Gaza Strip — Hamas on Thursday launched the our bodies of 4 Israeli hostages, mentioned to incorporate a mom and her two younger kids who’ve lengthy been feared lifeless and had come to embody the nation’s agony following the Oct. 7, 2023, assault by Hamas on Israel.

The stays had been mentioned to be these of Shiri Bibas and her two kids, Ariel and Kfir, in addition to Oded Lifshitz, who was 83 when he was kidnapped. Kfir, who was 9 months outdated when he was taken, was the youngest of all of the captives. Hamas has mentioned all 4 had been killed together with their guards in Israeli airstrikes.

“Each dwelling in Israel bows its head at the moment. We bow our heads for the heavy lack of our 4 hostages,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu mentioned in a press release. “The 4 coffins of our family members oblige us greater than ever to vow, to swear, that what occurred on October 7 won’t ever occur once more.”

The militants displayed 4 black caskets on a stage surrounded by banners, together with a big one depicting Netanyahu as a vampire, as Crimson Cross automobiles arrived on the scene within the Gaza Strip. 

The fighters then carried the caskets over to Crimson Cross automobiles, the place staffers in crimson vests lined them in white sheets earlier than inserting them inside. Every casket had an image mounted to the entrance bearing the picture of the slain hostage whose stays had been purportedly inside.

The Crimson Cross convoy headed again to Israel, the place authorities had been finishing up a proper identification course of on the stays utilizing DNA, which was anticipated to take as much as two days. An announcement from the Lifshitz household, nonetheless, shared by the Hostages Households Discussion board, mentioned that they had “acquired with deep sorrow the official and bitter information confirming the identification of our beloved Oded’s physique.”

“We had hoped and prayed a lot for a unique end result. Now we are able to mourn the husband, father, grandfather, and great-grandfather who has been lacking from us since October 7,” the household mentioned, including that their “therapeutic course of will start now and won’t finish till the final hostage is returned.”

1000’s of individuals, together with giant numbers of masked and armed fighters from Hamas and different factions, gathered on the handover web site on the outskirts of the southern Gaza metropolis of Khan Younis.

Israeli channels didn’t broadcast the handover. In Hostage Sq. in Tel Aviv, the place Israelis have gathered to observe the discharge of residing hostages, a big display confirmed a compilation of pictures and movies of Lifshitz and the Bibas household, together with a chuckling child Kfir and the household dressed up in Batman costumes. Yarden Bibas, the youngsters’s father, was not along with his household on Oct. 7, however was taken individually. He was launched earlier this month after 16 months in captivity.

Dozens of residents of Kibbutz Nir Oz, from which the 4 slain hostages launched on Thursday had been kidnapped, gathered to wave Israeli flags exterior of their short-term dwelling an hour north of the ravaged kibbutz.

Israelis have celebrated the return of 24 residing hostages in current weeks beneath a tenuous ceasefire that paused over 15 months of struggle. However the handover on Thursday will present a grim reminder of those that died in captivity because the talks main as much as the truce dragged on for over a yr.

It may additionally present impetus for negotiations on the second stage of the ceasefire which have hardly begun. The primary part is about to finish at first of March.

Kfir Bibas was simply 9 months outdated, a red-headed toddler with a toothless smile, when militants stormed into the household’s dwelling on Oct. 7, 2023. His brother Ariel was 4. Video shot that day confirmed a terrified Shiri swaddling the 2 boys as militants led them into Gaza.

Kinfolk in Israel have clung to hope, marking Kfir’s first and second birthdays and his brother’s fifth. The Bibas household mentioned in a press release Wednesday that it could anticipate “identification procedures” earlier than acknowledging that their family members had been lifeless.

Supporters all through Israel have worn orange in solidarity with the household — a reference to 2 boys’ crimson hair — and a well-liked kids’s music was written of their honor.

Just like the Bibas household, Oded Lifshitz was kidnapped from Kibbutz Nir Oz, alongside along with his spouse Yocheved, who was freed throughout a weeklong ceasefire in November 2023. Oded was a journalist who campaigned for the popularity of Palestinian rights and peace between Arabs and Jews.

Hamas-led militants kidnapped 251 hostages, together with some 30 kids, within the Oct. 7 terrorist assault, by which additionally they killed some 1,200 folks, largely civilians.

Greater than half the hostages, and a lot of the girls and kids, have been launched in ceasefire agreements or different offers. Israeli forces have rescued eight and have recovered dozens of our bodies of individuals killed within the preliminary assault or who died in captivity.

Hamas is about to free six residing hostages on Saturday in change for a whole lot extra Palestinian prisoners, and says it can launch 4 extra our bodies subsequent week, finishing the ceasefire’s first part. That can go away the militants with some 60 hostages, all males, round half of whom are believed to be lifeless.

Hamas has mentioned it will not launch the remaining captives with out a lasting ceasefire and a full Israeli withdrawal. Netanyahu, with the complete backing of the Trump administration, says he’s dedicated to destroying Hamas’ army and governing capacities and returning all of the hostages, objectives broadly seen as mutually unique.

Mr. Trump’s proposal to take away some 2 million Palestinians from Gaza so the U.S. can personal and rebuild it, which has been welcomed by Netanyahu however universally rejected by Palestinians and Arab international locations, has thrown the ceasefire into additional doubt.

Hamas could possibly be reluctant to free extra hostages if it believes the struggle will resume with the purpose of annihilating the group or forcibly transferring Gaza’s inhabitants.

Israel’s army offensive killed over 48,000 Palestinians, largely girls and kids, based on Gaza’s Hamas-run Well being Ministry, which doesn’t distinguish between civilians and combatants in its data. Israel says it has killed over 17,000 fighters, with out offering proof.

The offensive destroyed huge areas of Gaza, lowering complete neighborhoods to fields of rubble and bombed-out buildings. At its peak, the struggle displaced 90% of Gaza’s inhabitants. Many have returned to their properties to search out nothing left and no method of rebuilding.

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