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LAST UPDATE | 20 Feb
HAMAS HAS HANDED over the bodies of four Israelis today, including those of a mother and her two young sons who became symbols of the hostage crisis in Israel.
The bodies are those of Shiri Bibas, her two young boys – Kfir and Ariel – and a fourth captive, Oded Lifshitz, according to Hamas. Kfir Bibas was the youngest person taken captive during the Hamas-led attack on Israel in October 2023. He was just nine months old at the time.
Yarden Bibas, the boys’ father and Shiri’s husband, was abducted separately on the same day. He was released from the Gaza Strip in a round of captive exchanges on 1 February.
Footage of the family’s abduction, filmed and broadcast by Hamas during the attack, showed the mother and her sons being seized from their home near the Gaza border.
The Bibas family have become almost synonymous with the plight of the hostages held in Gaza during the war. Uncertainty about their fate has been a source of anxiety and a faint sense of hope in Israel, despite Hamas saying more than a year ago that they were dead.
Hamas said in November 2023, not long after the war began, that the hostages were killed by an Israeli airstrike, but Israel had yet to confirm they were dead up until today, leaving Israelis with a sliver of hope that they might still be alive.
A forensic examination of the bodies will take place in Israel today.
As a convoy of military and police vehicles brought the remains to a forensic lab for identification, people lines the road waving Israeli flags and singing the national anthem, The Times of Israel reported.
The bodies had been laid out in black coffins on a stage in Khan Younis this morning before they were received by the Red Cross. Each casket was shown with a photo of the person whose body was inside.
Red Cross staff loaded the caskets onto trucks after covering them in white shrouds as a crowd of hundreds watched in the rain.
“The hostages’ bodies were handed over to IDF (military) and ISA (security agency) representatives in Gaza”, an Israeli military spokesperson said.
In a statement issued today, Hamas said: “We would have preferred your sons to return to you alive, but your army and government leaders chose to kill them instead of bringing them back.”
The Israeli campaign group the Hostages and Missing Families Forum said it had been informed about the “heart-shattering” news of the deaths of the three Bibas family members.
The Bibas family said it would wait for a confirmation from official channels.
“Should we receive devastating news, it must come through the proper official channels after all identification procedures are completed,” it said in a statement yesterday.
The family forums said today that a gathering would take place at the so-called Hostages Square, which is located in central Tel Aviv near to the Israeli army’s headquarters.
“Together we will carry the pain and memory, and declare in a clear voice: Time has run out for the hostages who remain behind! They must be returned immediately – the living for rehabilitation, and the fallen for proper burial,” the group said.
The square has been the site of encampments and protests held by those who have criticised the Israeli government’s failure to secure the release of the hostages who remain in Gaza.
Posters featuring pictures of the Bibas family members have been a mainstay in the square throughout the war, where Israelis have gathered to watch live footage of previous hostage releases.
Israeli have gathered in the square throughout the conflict wearing orange to represent the Bibas family, a reference to their red hair.
At this painful and difficult time, as four fallen hostages are returned, crowds are gathering together at Hostages Square in Tel Aviv.
— Bring Them Home Now (@bringhomenow) February 20, 2025
Photo credit: Paulina Patimer, Adar Eyal pic.twitter.com/mEu0vi9UNm
Today, however, the handover was not televised at the request of the slain hostages’ families.
Israeli President Isaac Herzog has said “Our hearts – the hearts of an entire nation – lie in tatter”, and asked for forgiveness for failing to bring the hostages back alive.
Agony. Pain. There are no words.
— יצחק הרצוג Isaac Herzog (@Isaac_Herzog) February 20, 2025
Our hearts — the hearts of an entire nation — lie in tatters.
On behalf of the State of Israel, I bow my head and ask for forgiveness. Forgiveness for not protecting you on that terrible day. Forgiveness for not bringing you home safely.
May…
“On behalf of the State of Israel, I bow my head and ask for forgiveness,” Herzog said.
“Forgiveness for not protecting you on that terrible day. Forgiveness for not bringing you home safely. May their memory be a blessing.”
Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu said that today would be “a very difficult day for the State of Israel – a heartbreaking day, a day of grief”.
Today’s repatriation of the four bodies is part of the first phase of a fragile ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, which took effect on 19 January after more than 15 months of fighting in the Gaza Strip.
It is the first handover of remains by Hamas since the group took 251 people hostage during an attack on Israel in October 2023. Israel did return the bodies of Palestinians killed during the war, although without identification and in what officials described as a decomposed condition.
Under the ceasefire’s first phase, 19 Israeli hostages have been released by militants so far in exchange for more than 1,100 Palestinian prisoners in a series of Red Cross-mediated swaps.
Of the remaining 14 hostages held in Gaza who are eligible for release during phase one, Israel says eight are dead.
Hamas has offered to return all of the remaining captives in the second phase, the details of which are yet to be fully negotiated.
With reporting from AFP
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