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Killed by ‘bare hands’: Baby hostages fate stirs anger amid fragile ceasefire | Avi Melamed’s insights quoted in this article by Chris Kenning, Originally published in USA Today.
This article has already published in more that 225 other media and newspapers.
aturday’s exchange was still expected to take place. And it was still unclear how it might impact efforts to extend the deal. But renewed outrage could persuade more people that Gaza’s future must be “dramatically changed,” Avi Melamed, a former Israeli intelligence official who served as a negotiator during the first and second intifadas, told USA TODAY on Friday.
The children died by hand.
The red-headed Israeli boys, who came to embody the anguish of those kidnapped during Hamas’ attack on Israel, hadn’t been killed in an Israeli airstrike. Nor had they been shot.
Instead, Kfir and Ariel Bibas were killed with the “bare hands” of their captors, Israeli Defense Forces said Friday in findings based on forensic conclusions and intelligence. Then, their captors “committed horrific acts to cover up these atrocities.”
The announcement sent a fresh wave of grief and outrage rippling across Israel, one day after Hamas returned four hostage bodies including the children and what was said to be their mother, Shiri Bibas – but which Israeli authorities said just hours later was not Bibas but an unknown Palestinian from Gaza.
“My sweet nephews were taken alive from their home and murdered by a cruel terrorist organization while in captivity. They didn’t deserve such a fate,” Ofri Bibas Levy, an aunt to the boys, said in a video.
Later Friday, Hamas released another body claiming to be that of Shiri Bibas, whose misidentification a day earlier threatened to derail the fragile Gaza ceasefire deal.
Israeli medical authorities said forensic teams were preparing to examine the body, which Hamas transferred via the Red Cross and confirm its identity.
Anger over the fate of the Bibas family – whose faces had been plastered on posters and who became a rallying cry for hostages’ release – comes as Israel prepares for the next exchange of hostages for Palestinian prisoners on Saturday, the latest as part of a fragile ceasefire agreement.
Saturday’s exchange was still expected to take place. And it was still unclear how it might impact efforts to extend the deal. But renewed outrage could persuade more people that Gaza’s future must be “dramatically changed,” Avi Melamed, a former Israeli intelligence official who served as a negotiator during the first and second intifadas, told USA TODAY on Friday.
News of the children’s deaths hit especially hard in Israel partly because the image of Shiri Bibas, from a video taken during Hamas’ attack, was seared into the country’s collective memory as one of the most haunting of that day: A look of terror on her face, she clutches her two sons as armed militants cart them away to Gaza.
Gershon Baskin, Middle East director for peace-building group International Communities Organization, who helped negotiate the 2011 exchange of an Israeli soldier, told USA TODAY that whether or not presenting a different body as Shiri Bibas was a mistake, as Hamas has claimed, the overall effect of the family’s fate was nonetheless devastating.
“If the Israeli forensic report is correct about the brutal murder of the two infants the criminality and cruelty of Hamas is beyond compare. They have forfeited any human consideration. Who kidnaps babies and elderly people?” he said.
Further heightening tensions on Friday were the explosions on three empty buses in parking lots near Tel Aviv, and that bombs bad been discovered and disabled on two other buses, Reuters reported.
The BBC reported that Hamas had affirmed its “seriousness and full commitment to all our obligations” and had no interest in “non-compliance” related to the ceasefire agreement.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who earlier said that Israel would make Hamas pay for failing to release the body of Shiri Bibas as agreed, promised “vengeance” in a recorded speech after news of the children’s deaths on Friday. Others called to resume the fight against Hamas.
But the Hostages and Missing Families Forum kept pressing for prioritizing the return of hostages – despite the news about Ariel, 4, and Kfir, who was less than a year old. Their father, Yarden Bibas, was released in February.
“This barbaric act is yet another undeniable testament to the unfathomable brutality of those who continue to hold our loved ones captive. The very same hands that slaughtered Ariel and Kfir are the ones keeping our fathers, mothers, sons, and daughters in unimaginable conditions,” the group said in a post.
Six living hostages were due for release on Saturday in exchange for hundreds of Palestinian prisoners. The exchange due to begin around 8:30 a.m. local time would have kicked off negotiations for a second phase of the ceasefire in the coming days.
The boys’ aunt, Levy, said in her statement that, “for Ariel and Kfir’s sake, and for Yarden’s sake, we are not seeking revenge right now. We are asking for Shiri. Save the lives of the living hostages, and return all the fallen for burial,” she said.
She added a note to her lost nephews: “Luli and Firfir, I’m sorry I cannot yet cry for you. We are waiting for Mommy Shiri.”
Killed by ‘bare hands’: Baby hostages fate stirs anger amid fragile ceasefire | Avi Melamed’s insights quoted in this article by Chris Kenning, Originally published in USA Today.
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