Returning the bodies of grief of Israel’s grief

On a gloomy late winter day, under lead sky and from time to time driving, it was the moment when all the Israelis were afraid.

The return of the dead.

It has begun as all the show has started so far, with politically charged display by Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups involved in holding Israeli hostages for more than 500 days.

Once again, there was a stage surrounded by huge posters, emphasizing the catastrophic consequences of Israel’s military campaign in Gaza and the Palestinian determination to remain set.

But Instead of Haunted, Sometimes Emacoid, Survivors, There Were Four Coffins, Each Bearing A Photography and A Name – Oded Lifschitz, Shiri Bibas and Her Two Young Sons Israel’s Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu.

Missile shells wore the slogan: “They were killed by American bombs.” Hamas has long claimed that all four were killed by Israeli Gaza air attacks, something that was not checked.

As early as the Red Cross staff were on hand to control the process. In a rare public statement on the subject, they called on Hamas to conduct the broadcast in a private, decent manner.

Their efforts were obviously in vain, but they tried to cross the coffins from public control, dragging everyone in a white sheet before they were banished.

Watching the crowd was smaller than usual, maybe because of the heavy rain.

After the broadcast of Thursday morning, at a military ceremony on the edge of the Gaza Strip, the coffins carrying the hostages were draped with Israeli flags and prayers offered by the army’s main rabbi.

The convoy of vehicles then headed north to the Abu Kabir Forensic Institute in Jafa, where an official identification of the bodies was held.

On the route, small groups of Israelis stood silently in the rain, wearing Israeli flags and yellow banners – the color associated with the hostages and their supporters.

In Karmei Gat, where the displaced members of Kibbutz Nir Oz live, are waiting for them to go home, the vigil was particularly gloomy.

All four hostages released from Thursday were seized from Nir Oz on October 7, 2023.

Tel Aviv’s hostage square was a study of grief, with people crying or sitting on the ground, heads in their hands.

The faces of the red -headed Bibas Boys – Ariel and Kfir – are plastered on walls, road signs and in windows up and down in the country. Fearing the worst, the Israelis still adhered to the hope that the brothers may have survived with their mother.

“We were devastated by the news,” Orley Marron said outside Abu Kabir.

“I have red -headed grandchildren and seeing the photos is really very heartbreaking.”

Oded Lifshitz’s son, Izhar, in the meantime, told Israel’s radio that he was always afraid of his father’s health after his violent abduction in October 2023.

Oded was 84 years old at that time. He and his wife Yochev were taken to Han Enis in Gaza, where they were separated, never to be seen again.

Yocheved was released from Hamas two weeks after the attack.

“We need to close this wound and move forward,” Izhar said, adding that his father, a famous journalist and a peaceful activist, has long had a vision of how to resolve the conflicts of the Middle East.

“It’s sad that we went through this whole cycle and did not allow it,” Yidhar said. “We left it like something boiling and see where we are now.”

In the meantime, in Gaza, some Palestinians expressed their anger that the Israeli bodies had been betrayed, while an unknown number of Palestinians killed in Israel’s military campaign remained buried in the apocalyptic remains of the Gaza Strip.

In addition, 665 bodies are held by Israel in numbered cemeteries, according to the Palestinian Protest Group, the national campaign to restore the bodies of martyrs. It says some have been held for decades.

“I don’t like this agreement at all,” Ikram Abu Thessaloniki said in Han Henis. “They did not remove the ruins and we don’t even know where our children and families were.”

As he spoke, the bulldozers flying Egyptian flags finally arrived in North Gaza. Israel allowed the equipment to go in exchange for the broadcast of Thursday and the release of six more living hostages this next Saturday.