Hamas is set to hand over the bodies of four hostages on Thursday, including members of the Bibas family, who have come to symbolize the ongoing hostage crisis that has affected Israel since the Gaza war began.
This marks the first return of remains by Hamas since its attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, which triggered the conflict.
The militant group announced that the bodies of Shiri Bibas, her two young sons — Kfir and Ariel — and a fourth captive, Oded Lifshitz, would be handed over in the southern Gaza city of Khan Yunis.
Video footage from the October 7 attack showed Shiri Bibas and her sons, Ariel, then four, and Kfir, just nine months old, being taken from their home near the Gaza border. Yarden Bibas, Shiri’s husband and the boys’ father, was abducted separately but was released on February 1 in a prior hostage-prisoner exchange.
The repatriation is part of the initial phase of a delicate ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, which began on January 19 after over 15 months of fighting in Gaza.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu stated that Thursday would be “a very difficult day for the State of Israel — a heartbreaking day, a day of grief.” So far, under the ceasefire’s first phase, 19 Israeli hostages have been freed in exchange for over 1,100 Palestinian prisoners through a series of Red Cross-mediated swaps. Of the remaining 14 Gaza hostages eligible for release in this phase, Israel reports that eight are deceased.
The Bibas family has become a powerful symbol of the national trauma caused by the hostage crisis. Although Hamas claimed that they were killed in an Israeli airstrike early in the war, Israel has not confirmed this, leaving doubts among the Israeli public and the Bibas family.
On Wednesday, the Israeli campaign group Hostages and Missing Families Forum announced the “heart-shattering” news of the deaths of the three Bibas family members. However, the Bibas family stated they would wait for confirmation through official channels once identification procedures are completed.
The National Forensic Medicine Institute in Tel Aviv has prepared 10 doctors to speed up the identification process, according to public broadcaster Kan.
Israel and Hamas agreed earlier this week to return the remains of eight hostages in two groups over the coming days, along with the release of six living Israeli captives on Saturday. These six have been identified as Eliya Cohen, Tal Shoham, Omer Shem Tov, Omer Wenkert, Hisham al-Sayed, and Avera Mengistu.
Despite accusations of violations from both sides, the ceasefire has held. Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar announced that discussions would begin this week on the second phase of the ceasefire, which aims to establish a more permanent end to the conflict.
Senior Hamas official Taher al-Nunu stated that Hamas is willing to release all remaining hostages in Gaza in a single exchange during the second phase. However, he did not specify the number of hostages currently held by Hamas or other militant groups.
During the October 7 attack, Hamas and its allies took 251 people hostage, of whom 70 are still in Gaza, including 35 that the Israeli military believes are dead. The attack resulted in 1,211 deaths, mostly civilians, according to Israeli figures.
Israel’s subsequent military campaign in Gaza has killed at least 48,297 people, the majority civilians, according to health ministry figures from the Hamas-run territory, which the United Nations considers reliable.
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