The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said Thursday that the two Bibas children — Ariel, 5, and Kfir, 2 — whose corpses were handed over by Hamas were “brutally murdered,” not killed by an Israeli airstrike, as the terror group claimed.
In a gruesome ceremony, Hamas placed four coffins on a stage in front of a mural depicting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as a vampire, and claiming that he and his “Nazi army killed them with missiles from Zionist warplanes.”
KHAN YUNIS, GAZA – FEBRUARY 20: Bodies of the Bibas family (three members) and Oded Lifshitz are handed over to the Red Cross teams in Bani Suheila municipality cemetry under a Gaza ceasefire and prisoner-hostage swap agreement in Khan Yunis Governorate, Gaza on February 20, 2025. Ahead of the handover, Hamas placed four black caskets on a stage in Khan Younis, behind which a banner was displayed depicting Netanyahu as Dracula, the infamous vampire, positioned above images of the Bibas family and Lifshitz. The bodies of Shiri Bibas, and her two children; Ariel and Kfir, and Oded Lifshitz were handed over to Red Cross representatives in Khan Younis city in the southern Gaza Strip. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office confirmed that the army and the Shin Bet domestic security service received caskets containing the four bodies from the Red Cross. (Photo by Ali Jadallah/Anadolu via Getty Images)
A few Israeli hostages have, in fact, been killed accidentally in airstrikes or on the battlefield.
However, the IDF said that forensic examination of the corpses revealed that the boys had been murdered by Hamas:
Following the completion of the identification process by the National Institute of Forensic Medicine in collaboration with the Israel Police, IDF representatives informed the Bibas family that their loved ones, Ariel and Kfir Bibas, have been identified.
According to the assessment of professional officials, based on the intelligence available to us and forensic findings from the identification process, Ariel and Kfir Bibas were brutally murdered by terrorists in captivity in November 2023.
During the identification process, it was determined that the additional body received is not that of Shiri Bibas, and no match was found for any other hostage. This is an anonymous, unidentified body.
This is a violation of utmost severity by the Hamas terrorist organization, which is obligated under the agreement to return four deceased hostages. We demand that Hamas return Shiri home along with all our hostages.
Ariel Bibas was four years old at the time of his death, and Kfir Bibas was ten months old at the time of his death. They were abducted with their mother, Shiri Bibas, from their home in Nir Oz. Yarden Bibas, Ariel and Kfir’s father, went out to protect them and was abducted prior to the abduction of Shiri and the children. Yarden returned as part of the agreement for the return of the hostages on February 1, 2025.
We extend our heartfelt condolences to the Bibas family during this incredibly difficult time and remain committed to doing everything possible to ensure Shiri and all the hostages are brought home at the earliest opportunity.
As noted above, one of the corpses was that of an unidentified individual, not mother Shiri Bibas.
Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of The Agenda: What Trump Should Do in His First 100 Days, available for pre-order on Amazon. He is also the author of The Trumpian Virtues: The Lessons and Legacy of Donald Trump’s Presidency, now available on Audible. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.
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