After the joy of the liberations, the families of the hostages are in mourning. The Israeli military has confirmed the death of five hostages held captive in the Gaza Strip, its spokesman Daniel Hagari said Friday. He said the IDF had informed the families. "In recent days, the Israeli army and police have informed the families of hostages Eliyahu Margalit (75), Maya Goren (56), Ronen Engel (54) and Arie Zalmanovich (86) of their deaths," he said at a press briefing.
These four Israelis all lived or worked in Kibbutz Nir Oz. Arié Zalmanovich even helped create this village near the border with the Gaza Strip.
"A committee of experts from the Ministry of Health, the Institute of Forensic Medicine, the Chief Rabbinate and the Ministry of Religious Affairs established their deaths based on findings (of an investigation) and intelligence information," the IDF spokesman said. In addition, "during a joint operation with the Shin Bet (internal security service), based on specific information, we brought back the body of hostage Ofir Zarfati for burial in Israel," Hagari added.
Still uncertainty surrounding the Bibas family
Of the approximately 240 people kidnapped on October 7 in Hamas' unprecedented deadly attack in southern Israel and taken to the Gaza Strip, 137 are still being held there, Israeli authorities said earlier. "136 hostages, including 17 women and children" are still being held there, the army spokesman said.
He also reiterated that Hamas' allegations about the deaths of Shiri Bibas and her two children, Ariel, 4, and Kfir, 10 months old — the youngest of the hostages — "have not been confirmed." The Islamist movement says all three were killed in an Israeli bombardment ahead of the seven-day truce in the war, which erupted on Friday morning. "The Bibas family, the mother and her children, were supposed to return to Israel and Hamas chose not to do that," Hagari said of the daily deal to exchange hostages from Gaza for Palestinian detainees that accompanied the truce.
This agreement led to the release of 80 hostages from Gaza, mainly women and minors, Israeli or dual nationals, in exchange for the release of 240 detainees in Israeli prisons. Twenty-five other hostages were released from Gaza outside the framework of the agreement.