‘The abductees Itay Svirsky and Yossi Sharabi were murdered in captivity and their bodies are held by Hamas.’
Kibbutz Be’eri in southern Israel announced on Tuesday that two of its residents, Itay Svirsky and Yossi Sharabi, were killed in Gaza and that their bodies remain in the hands of the Hamas terror group.
“The abductees Itay Svirsky and Yossi Sharabi were murdered in captivity and their bodies are held by Hamas,” kibbutz officials said, calling for their bodies to be returned for burial and for the release of all hostages in Gaza.
Svirsky, 38, and Sharabi, 53, were among the 240 hostages kidnapped by Hamas-led Palestinian terrorists during their Oct. 7 onslaught across southern Israel. The massacre, in which 1,200 people were murdered, triggered the ongoing Israel-Hamas war in Gaza, the Palestinian enclave ruled by the terror group.
Israeli officials have said they will continue their military campaign in Gaza until all the hostages are freed and Hamas is incapacitated to the point that it no longer poses a serious threat to Israel. About 130 hostages remain in Gaza after over 100 were released as part of a temporary Israel-Hamas truce in late November.
Svirsky, Sharabi, and 26-year-old Noa Argamani — who was filmed on now-viral video being abducted from the Nova music festival during Hamas’ Oct. 7 massacre — were featured in a chilling video released by Hamas on Sunday. The terror group showed undated, edited-together clips of all three identifying themselves to the camera, describing their plight, and asking to go home.
The 37-second clip, which marked 100 days since the hostages’ abduction, ended with the chyron: “Tomorrow [Monday] we will inform you of their fate.”
Hamas then teased in a follow-up video, released on Monday, that the three hostages could either be killed, injured, or spared, asking viewers for their opinions. The video showed the three hostages’ faces.
“What do you think?” the Palestinian terrorists said of the captives. Hamas then offered three options for the innocent victims: all three are killed; “some are killed, some are injured,” or all three are spared.
It ended with the message: “Tonight we will inform you of their fate.”
Later on Monday, Hamas released a new video of Argamani, evidently under distress and seemingly reading a script in front of a blank white wall, being forced to report that Svirsky and Sharabi were dead. She said that her fellow captives were killed by Israeli air strikes targeting Hamas.
Israel’s chief military spokesperson disputed some of Hamas’ claims, specifying that Svirsky was not killed by Israeli fire.
“Itay was not killed by our forces. This is a Hamas lie. The building where they were held was not a target and was not attacked by our forces,” said IDF Spokesman Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari. “We don’t attack a place if we know there may be hostages inside.” Hagari noted that areas nearby had been targeted.
The Israeli army reportedly believes that Argamani is alive.
The videos were the latest in what Israel has described as Hamas’ “psychological warfare” and “torment” since the outbreak of war in October, meant to cause distress in Israeli society and pressure Jerusalem to stop its military campaign in Gaza.
Kibbutz Be’eri was one of the hardest hit Israeli communities during the atrocities of Oct. 7. It was almost completely burnt down by Hamas terrorists, who killed about 130 people there — a staggering 10 percent of the kibbutz’s residents. Several others were taken as hostages.