A body released by Hamas overnight was confirmed to be Shiri Bibas, the Israeli mother whose two young sons also died in captivity, her family and Israel authorities said.
The misidentification of Bibas’s body this week had threatened the fragile ceasefire between Hamas and Israel.
Hamas said her remains were returned to Israel with those of her sons and another hostage on Thursday. However, testing confirmed the identities of the three others, but found the remains said to be of Bibas were instead of an unidentified Palestinian woman.
Bibas was kidnapped with her two small sons and her husband during the Hamas attack on 7 October 2023.
Hamas late on Friday handed over another body, which Bibas’s family confirmed to be hers. "Last night, our Shiri was returned home," the family said in a statement, which said she had been identified by Israel's Institute of Forensic Medicine.
Palestinian Mujahedeen Brigades, the small militant group believed to have been holding Bibas and her sons, said they turned over the correct set of remains to the Red Cross, which sent them to Israel for testing.
"For 16 months we sought certainty, and now that it's here, it brings no comfort, though we hope it marks the beginning of closure,” Bibas’s family said.
The Israel Defence Forces (IDF) on Friday confirmed it had received the remains of her sons Kfir Bibas, who was 10 months old at the time of his death, and his brother Ariel Bibas, who was four.
Both boys “were brutally murdered by terrorists in captivity in November 2023”, the Israeli military said.
Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu this week accused Hamas of a "cruel and malicious violation" of the ceasefire and vowed revenge following the misidentification of Bibas’s body. But he refrained from walking away from the ceasefire agreement, which took effect on 19 January.
“We will work with determination to bring Shiri home together with all our hostages – both living and dead – and ensure that Hamas pays the full price for this cruel and malicious violation of the agreement," the prime minister had said, promising to “avenge” their deaths.
Hamas vowed to “conduct a thorough review” of the information regarding the body. The group said a mix-up of the remains may have happened due to the Israeli bombing of the area where hostages were held.
Hamas on Saturday released five Israeli hostages, including a man held captive for over ten years. The Palestinian group is expected to free a total of six hostages from Gaza, while Israel is expected to release 602 Palestinian prisoners and detainees held in its jails.
Tal Shoam, 40, who was seized from Kibbutz Be’eri on 7 October 2023, and Avera Mengistu, who has been held since when he crossed into Gaza in 2014, were both handed over to International Red Cross officials in Rafah, southern Gaza. The Israeli military said the pair had now crossed into Israel where they were due to meet their families.
Later in front of hundreds of Palestinians in the central town of Nuseirat, three Israeli men — Omer Wenkert, 23 Omer Shem Tov, 22 and Eliya Cohen, 27 — were brought out by masked, armed Hamas fighters to pose on a stage dressed in fake army uniforms, though they were not soldiers when they were kidnapped. The trio were all seized from the Nova Festival on 7 October 2023.
The ceasefire has brought a pause in the fighting, but prospects of a definitive end to the war remain unclear. The war began after Hamas killed some 1,200 people and took 251 hostages during its attack on Israel.
Israel’s retaliatory war on Gaza killed at least 48,000 people and reduced much of the enclave to rubble, leaving some hundreds of thousands in makeshift shelters and dependent on aid trucks, according to the health ministry in the Hamas-run Strip.
Both sides have said they intend to start talks on a second stage of the ceasefire, which mediators say aims to agree on the return of around 60 remaining hostages and the withdrawal of Israeli troops.
