The Israeli military said on Wednesday it had retrieved the body of Itay Svirsky, who was taken hostage on Oct. 7, 2023, and then killed in Hamas captivity, according to a statement from the Israeli military.
A statement from the Hostages’ Families Forum said returning “Itay’s body for proper burial in Israel provides crucial closure for his family.”
A statement from the military said the family had been notified.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said Svirsky’s body had been retrieved in a special operation and he thanked Israeli security forces.
“Our hearts are torn over the heavy loss of the Svirsky family,” Netanyahu said.
‘Highly probable’ 6 prior deaths ‘related’ to airstrike
The news came the same day that the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) revealed that the deaths of six other hostages — whose bodies were recovered in August — were likely linked to an Israeli airstrike that occurred months earlier, near the area where they were being held.
The Israeli military says it has recovered the bodies of six hostages taken in Hamas’s Oct. 7 attack that started the war in Gaza. The military said its forces recovered the bodies in an overnight operation in southern Gaza, without saying when or how the six died.
“At the time of the strike, the military had no information, not even a suspicion, that the hostages were in the underground compound or its vicinity,” the IDF said in a statement about the investigation into the hostages’ deaths.
“Had such information been available, the strike would not have been carried out.”
The statement said it was “highly probable that their deaths were related to the strike near the location where they were held,” although the precise circumstances were still not clear.
The military said the airstrike occurred in February, while the bodies of the hostages were recovered in late August.
The most plausible scenario was that they were shot by Palestinian militants around the time of the strike, it said. It was also possible that they had already been killed previously, or that they were shot after they were already dead.
“Due to the extended time that had passed, it was not possible to determine clearly the cause of the death of hostages or the exact timing of the gunfire.”
A continuing tension
The fate of the hostages has been a point of continuing tension in Israel, with family members publicly advocating for the state to prioritize their loved ones’ release as it continues its campaign against Hamas in Gaza.
A separate report on Wednesday underscored why fears exist about the safety of remaining hostages: Hamas said it had information that Israel intended to carry out a hostage rescue operation similar to one conducted in Gaza’s Nuseirat camp in June, and it threatened to “neutralize” the captives if such an operation took place, according to an internal statement seen by Reuters.
The need for a deal to release the hostages was one of the points of discord that Yoav Gallant, Israel’s former defence minister, pointed to when he was dismissed by Netanyahu last month.
U.S. president-elect Donald Trump earlier this week called for the immediate release of the hostages, threatening unstated consequences if that does not happen before he returns to the Oval Office.
War in Gaza erupted on Oct. 7, 2023, when Hamas-led militants launched a surprise cross-border attack on Israel.
Roughly 1,200 people were killed, and Hamas took some 250 people hostage and brought them across the border into neighbouring Gaza, according to Israel tallies.
Israel declared war on Hamas and launched a ground campaign in Gaza, which continues more than a year later. More than 44,000 people have been killed in Gaza since, according to authorities there.
