The Israel Defense Forces announced on Sunday the death of soldier Sgt. Oz Daniel, 19, who was killed and kidnapped by Hamas
...the braying voice of Islamic Resistance®,...on October 7, as the war against the terror group raged for its 142nd day.
Daniel served in the 7th Armored Brigade’s 77th Battalion, and his body was taken from the Gazoo
...Hellhole adjunct to Israel and Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, inhabited by Gazooks. The place was acquired in the wake of the 1967 War and then presented to Paleostinian control in 2006 by Ariel Sharon, who had entered his dotage. It is currently ruled with an iron fist by Hamas with about the living conditions you'd expect. It periodically attacks the Hated Zionist Entity whenever Iran needs a ruckus created or the hard boyz get bored, getting thumped by the IDF in return. The ruling turbans then wave the bloody shirt and holler loudly about
oppressionand
disproportionate response...
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Until now, he was listed as one of the 253 hostages kidnapped by the terror group on October 7. Recently, the army’s chief rabbi declared Daniel’s death based on findings and new intelligence information.
While Daniel’s body remains in Gaza, his family can sit shiva, the traditional Jewish week-long mourning period, according to Jewish law, religious authorities said. A funeral was slated to be held Monday at 2 p.m. at the military cemetery in his hometown of Kfar Saba.
It is believed that 130 hostages kidnapped by Hamas on October 7 remain in Gaza — not all of them alive — after 105 civilians were released from Hamas captivity during a weeklong truce in late November, and four hostages were released prior to that.
Three hostages have been rescued by troops alive, and the bodies of 11 hostages have also been recovered, including three mistakenly killed by the military.
The IDF has now confirmed the deaths of 31 of those still held by Hamas — including Daniel — citing new intelligence and findings obtained by troops operating in Gaza. One more person is listed as missing since October 7, and her fate is still unknown, though her family believes she was killed.
Hamas is also holding the bodies of fallen IDF soldiers Oron Shaul and Hadar Goldin since 2014, as well as two Israeli civilians, Avera Mengistu and Hisham al-Sayed, who are both thought to be alive after entering the Strip of their own accord in 2014 and 2015, respectively.
Earlier Sunday, the IDF announced the death of two soldiers killed during fighting in the southern Gaza Strip over the weekend, bringing the toll of slain troops in the ground offensive against Hamas to 240.
In all, 580 Israeli soldiers and reservists have been killed amid the war, more than half of them during the October 7 onslaught.
Bilha Yinon, a 76-year-old who lived with her husband Yakov in Moshav Netiv Ha’asara, was last heard from at 8 a.m. on October 7.
Her house was burned down by Hamas terrorists who infiltrated the community via paragliders amid their murderous onslaught against southern Israel. She was initially considered dead along with her husband, but a lack of DNA evidence led the IDF to retract that conclusion.
“They still haven’t found her,” the Yinons’ daughter, Maayan, told Channel 12 news in an interview aired Saturday evening. “They can’t conclusively identify. They can’t recover DNA.”
During the October 7 massacre, which saw Hamas terrorists kill some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and kidnap 253, an estimated 35 Hamas operatives entered Netiv Ha’asara — a community that sits 100 meters from the border with Gaza — and killed 22 people.
“Dad sent us a WhatsApp message at 7:30 a.m. that they’re sitting in the safe room, the house is locked, and they’re hearing a lot of shooting and rockets,” Maayan recalled in the interview. “By 7:45 a.m. they were already disconnected and not answering. The house got a direct hit and was on fire within minutes. This was a house built with light materials like plaster and plywood.”
“I said that my parents didn’t survive this event,” the Yinons’ other daughter, Mor, told Channel 12. “By 10 a.m., I wrote my cousins that they should prepare themselves for a very very difficult day.”
The daughters, however, are convinced of their mother’s fate. Between the house being burnt down and conversations with neighbors who saw the terrorists, the family decided to sit shiva – the traditional seven-day mourning period for Jews – without holding a funeral. “Her place is with dad. They left this world together.”
The daughters told Channel 12 that they are not entertaining the possibility that Bilha was taken hostage because no other kidnappings were reported in Netiv Ha’asara on October 7.
“There’s a disagreement between the fire services – who say that the fire was at a very high temperature and that it’s certainly possible that DNA can’t be recovered – and the [forensic scientists] who say that that can’t be, something can always be recovered,” Mor said.
Lt. Col. Dana Nof, an IDF reserve officer responsible for maintaining contact with the Yinon family, is not willing to reach a verdict. “This is a mystery that we’re trying to solve. It’s not a mystery that will just remain a mystery. We’re trying to conclude whether Bilha is alive or not,” she told Channel 12.
Bilha and Yakov requested in their will that their bodies be cremated and spread out over the grounds of Netiv Ha’asara because they did not want their bodies to take up land. The will, however, cannot be executed until the daughters are given a final answer from the government regarding the fate of Bilha.
“A district court appointed me to be the temporary estate manager for my mom,” Mor told Channel 12. “I am conducting transactions in my mom’s bank account on her behalf. These things are a bit absurd and emotionally difficult. It feels like some kind of pretend game to me.”
Maayan told Channel 12 that Bilha was a regular at anti-judicial overhaul protests that occurred throughout 2023 until October 7, and showed a suitcase Bilha would take with her that had “Benjamin Netanyahu, take this and leave” written on it.
Bilha Yinon is currently the only person considered officially “missing” by the State of Israel following the October 7 attack, with an additional 130 people believed to be held hostage in Gaza, including the bodies of 31 people who the IDF has confirmed were killed before or after they were kidnapped.