‘Hamas will pay the full price’ for murdering Bibas family, withholding mother’s body, Netanyahu vows

By David Rosenberg, World Israel News

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu castigated Hamas Friday morning, and warned that Israel would “seek justice” against the terror organization, after Israeli forensics examiners found that two small children taken hostage were murdered.

“The State of Israel bows its head over the loss of two small children, tender infants, brothers—Ariel and Kfir Bibas, may their memory be a blessing, and over Oded Lifshitz, may his memory be a blessing, one of the founders of Kibbutz Nir Oz,” Netanyahu said in a Hebrew-language video statement.

“All three were brutally murdered in Hamas captivity during the first weeks of the war. The cruelty of the Hamas monsters knows no bounds.”

Netanyahu ripped Hamas not only for the murders of the Bibas children – both of whom were, according to the Abu Kabir Forensic Institute, murdered in November 2023 – but also for using their bodies in a propaganda display in Gaza on Thursday.

The premier also lambasted the terror group for refusing to return the body of the boys’ mother, Shiri Bibas. Hamas claimed it handed over Shiri’s remains on Thursday, but examiners at Abu Kabir determined that the body was not that of Mrs. Bibas.

“Not only did they abduct the father, Yarden Bibas, the young mother, Shiri, and their two little babies, but in an act of unimaginable cynicism, they did not return Shiri to her small children, these little angels, and instead placed the body of a Gazan woman in the coffin.”

Netanyahu pledged that Hamas would pay “the full price” for violating the ceasefire and hostage deal with Israel.

“We will act with determination to bring Shiri home, along with all our captives—both the living and the fallen—and we will ensure that Hamas pays the full price for this cruel and vicious breach of the agreement.”

“May the sacred memory of Oded Lifshitz, Ariel, and Kfir Bibas be forever enshrined in the heart of the nation. May God avenge their blood. And we, too, will seek justice.”

Shiri’s husband, Yarden, the father of Kfir and Ariel, was released on February 1st, as part of the ceasefire deal.

Israel contends that the substitution of another body for the remains of Shiri Bibas constitutes a violation of the hostage deal.

On Friday, Hamas issued a statement admitting that it had not returned Mrs. Bibas’ remains.

The terror group claimed that Shiri Bibas was killed in an IDF airstrike – despite forensic evidence from the Bibas children that they were not killed as a result of an airstrike.

“Shiri Bibas’ remains apparently became mixed with the remains of other dead under the rubble, after the IAF struck the place where she was staying,” Hamas claimed.