Bodies of Kfir, Ariel and Shiri Bibas will be handed over on Thursday, Israel confirms

The slain hostages set for return on Thursday are Shiri, Ariel and Kfir Bibas and Oded Lifshitz, Israel has confirmed.

Their families have been notified.

“In this difficult time, our hearts are with the grieving families”, the prime minister’s office said. “We will continue to provide reliable updates as needed and ask to refrain from spreading rumors or unofficial information.”

Ariel, 5, and Kfir, 2, the youngest of the Israeli hostages, and their parents Yarden and Shiri were abducted from their home at Kibbutz Nir Oz by Hamas terrorists on October 7. Kfir was just nine months old at the time they were taken.

Oded Lifshitz was taken from Kibbutz Nir Oz on the morning of Saturday, October 7 – he was 83 at the time.

Ariel and Kfir’s father, Yarden, 34, was released earlier this month.

Baby Kfir was abducted as a nine-month-old alongside his parents and brother during the October 7, 2023 Hamas attacks (Picture: Getty)[Missing Credit]

Following his release from Hamas captivity, Yarden’s family said that “a quarter of our heart has returned to us after 15 long months”, but stated that the father of two would be returning to an “unbearable reality”.

Yarden’s release raised the alarm about the status of Ariel, Kfir and Shiri. Under the international humanitarian rules, women and children should be released prior to their male relatives or any combatants.

The fate of his children and his wife has gripped the Jewish nation since a video circulated of a distraught Shiri anxiously clutching the boys as the three were seized by Hamas and taken to Gaza.

Shiri Bibas and her sons Ariel, 4, and baby Kfir, as they are abducted from Kibbutz Nir Oz on October 7, 2023[Missing Credit]

Two weeks ago, supporters in Israel and across the world donned orange clothing, representing the fiery hair of the young brothers.

“Orange day” was the latest activist initiative designed to keep the world’s attention on the plight of the Bibas family. Graffiti in honour of Kfir, Ariel and their parents has sprung up across Israel, including one mural in Tel Aviv displaying the older brother pushing a stroller with the words: “Ariel will never be the same again.”

Ariel, Kfir and their mother were named on the list of 33 Israeli hostages to be released in exchange for Palestinian prisoners in the first phase of the ceasefire.

An Israeli government spokesperson said on January 27 that eight of the remaining 26 hostages due to be released in the first, six-week phase of the deal were deceased but that Hamas had not differentiated between living and dead captives.

Hamas claimed in November 2023 that the two children and their mother had been killed in an Israeli airstrike, but provided no evidence. It again claimed they were dead in a statement earlier this week.

The terror group has previously promulgated misinformation regarding hostages, publishing various claims that a captive had died, only for them to be released alive months later.

Reports by Kan, Israel’s public broadcaster, indicate that during his time in captivity, Yarden suffered grave psychological abuse including being forced to make a video soon after being told by his captors that his wife and sons had been killed, where he is seen begging for their bodies to be returned to Israel and blaming Netanyahu for their deaths. The IDF dubbed the video propaganda.

The Bibas family has shared that they felt their "world came crashing down" each week when Shiri, Kfir, and Ariel were left off the list of those expected to be released.

The children’s grandfather, Eli Bibas, recently spoke to a crowd at Hostages Square in Tel Aviv, remarking that he was “trying not to drown in a sea of rumors, the news, the half-truths and lies around the negotiations”. Today’s terrible news crushed all remaining hope,