The people of Israel embraced them on their final journey, turning out in multitudes along the funeral route for a family that had become emblematic of the country’s trauma after the Oct. 7, 2023, attack.
Shiri Bibas and her two young sons, Ariel and Kfir, were kidnapped during the Hamas-led attack on southern Israel, taken to Gaza, and killed in captivity, according to the Israeli authorities. On Wednesday, amid a national outpouring of solidarity and grief, they were buried under a blue sky, not far from the border community where they had lived and from which they were seized.
Through 16 months of fear and uncertainty over their fates, the Bibases had become a symbol for many Israelis, both of the tragedy that befell their country that October day, when about 1,200 people were killed and about 250 abducted to Gaza, but also of a widespread sense of abandonment. The military had failed to come to their rescue and the government failed to bring them, and many other hostages, home in time.
Ms. Bibas was 32 when she was abducted. Ariel was 4, and Kfir, the youngest hostage, was not even nine months old. Yarden Bibas, Shiri’s husband and the father of the two redheaded boys, was abducted separately during the attack, which set off Israel’s 15-month war in Gaza that killed tens of thousands of Palestinians and left much of the enclave in ruins.
Mr. Bibas was returned to Israel alive early this month as part of a cease-fire deal for Gaza. The remains of Ms. Bibas and the children were returned to Israel last week. After forensic testing, Israel’s chief pathologist dismissed Hamas’s claims that they had been killed in an Israeli airstrike, though no evidence has been made public, in line with the family’s request for privacy.
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