Hope turns to heartbreak for Israel's Bibas hostage family

By Amir Cohen and Maayan Lubell

NIR OZ, Israel (Reuters) - A few hours after Hamas said it would return the bodies of Israeli hostages Shiri Bibas and her two little children on Thursday, her sister-in-law said she had not given up hope of seeing them return home, alive.

"I ask you not to eulogise my family yet," Ofri Bibas Levy posted on Facebook. "We have been hoping for 16 months and we will not give up hope now."

But when Hamas unveiled black coffins on a stage under a rain-washed grey sky in southern Gaza, with the photos of the two Bibas children and their mother pinned onto them, one on each of the caskets, hope in Israel turned to grief.

Shiri Bibas and her ginger-haired sons, Ariel and baby Kfir, have become symbols for Israelis of the ruthlessness of the October 7, 2023 attack, when they were abducted by Palestinian militants from their kibbutz, Nir Oz, and taken to Gaza.

One in four Nir Oz residents were either killed or kidnapped that day. Images of a terrified Shiri Bibas surrounded by gunmen and clutching her boys, aged four and nine months at the time, circulated on social media within hours of the abduction.

People carrying Israeli flags lined the 232 road near the Gaza border to pay tribute as a convoy transporting the bodies to Israel's forensic institute for identification, before a formal death announcement is made, drove past.

"We all hoped that this story would end differently. This is so sad and painful," said Noan Zuntz, from a nearby kibbutz.

A few miles away, in Nir Oz, tricycles and toys were still scattered on the lawn outside the Bibas' home, while the bullet-pierced front door carried posters of the four smiling family members.

Shiri's husband, Yarden Bibas, was also seized from the kibbutz but taken separately from the family. He was released on February 1 as part of the Israel-Hamas ceasefire that took effect a little over a month ago.

"MY LIGHT"

Most of the women and children among the 251 abducted in the Hamas-led attack were freed in a swap deal for Palestinian prisoners and detainees, women and minors, in a brief truce in late November 2023.

But they did not include Shiri and the children. At the time, Hamas said they had been killed in an Israeli airstrike.

Israel said it was unable to verify the claim and the three are not among the 36 Gaza hostages Israeli authorities have declared dead in absentia, based on intelligence and forensics.

A year ago, the Israeli military recovered CCTV video of them alive in Gaza on the day of their abduction and in the months that followed said only that there was serious concern for their lives.

On November 30, 2023, Hamas released a video of Yarden in captivity, pleading for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to bring them home, to be buried.

In a written statement to media six days after his release this month, Yarden intimated that his remarks in that video had been dictated to him, but repeated his request to Netanyahu to bring his family home.

"My light is still there, and as long as they're there, everything here is dark," he said. His sister, Ofri Bibas Levy, has said Yarden, 35, has been clinging to the hope that Hamas had lied to him about the fate of his wife and children.

Late on Wednesday, his family once again asked to refrain from eulogies until forensic identification is complete. Some in Nir Oz, still clung to hope of a miracle.

"Until we have the fact, dead or alive, we have the hope," said Yiftach Cohen, standing outside the Bibas family home.

In Tel Aviv, Israelis gathered at what has come to be known as Hostages Square, outside Israel's defence headquarters, as sorrow set in across the country.

"I think today is one of the saddest days of my 40 years in Israel," said Nicky Cregor, 60, a social worker from Jerusalem. "I feel that we have an endless wound in our hearts that is going to take a long time to heal."

(Additional reporting by Dedi Hayun in Jerusalem, Ilan Rozenberg on Road 232 and Michal Yaakov Itzhaki in Nir Oz; Writing by Maayan Lubell; Editing by Clarence Fernandez and Sharon Singleton)