In Pictures: IDF honours four dead Israeli hostages
Officers of Nahal Brigade salute the dead as they are returned home after more than 500 days
The IDF has released photographs from the ceremony in the Gaza Strip this morning showing them paying their last respects to the four Israeli hostages returned by Hamas after 501 days in captivity.
The moving ceremony was led by IDF Chief Rabbi Eyal Karim, who read Psalm 83 as IDF troops saluted.
The coffins, said by Hamas to contain the remains of Shiri Bibas, her young children Kfir and Ariel, and Oded Lifshitz, are draped in Israeli flags whilst carried by officers of the Nahal Brigade into military vehicles.
The bodies are now being brought to the Abu Kabir forensic institute in central Israel for identification.
Israel’s health minister Uriel Busso has said the process is also to establish the cause of death and is therefore expected to take some time. Only then will the families be informed.
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