On January 18, 2023, a baby was born to Shiri and Yarden Bibas. Like his brother Ariel, 4, Kfir's hair was orange, making the two children stand out in any room as well as in any photo. Alas, it is their photos which have made them internationally famous.
On October 7th, nine months after he was born, Kfir was to become the youngest of 251 hostages captured by Hamas during an attack on the southern region of Israel. The incursion saw murder, rape, destruction and kidnapping, including in Kibbutz Nir Oz, where the Bibas family lived. The perpetrators recorded their "successes" and made a point of publicizing them in real time. Hence a photo of a terrified Shiri embracing Ariel who is sucking on a pacifier, and the back of Kfir's head, his hair as soft as down.
Is Kfir alive? Perhaps not, as Hamas has indicated? Did he live to take his first steps? What was his first word? What about his brother Ariel, his mother Shiri and his father Yarden, who was kidnapped separately? The tragic truth is that we do not know, nor do we know the fate of those of 101 remaining hostages in Gaza whose death has not been confirmed, among them people aged eighty and older.
In November, elaborate diplomatic negotiations led to the release of 110 hostages. Since that time, actions by the Israeli army led to the release of seven more and to the return of some bodies, both of corpses which were snatched on October 7th and of those who died in captivity.
The hostages who were released alive and the bodies returned to Israel provide proof of physical and emotional abuse. Undernourishment bordering on starvation is but one aspect. Many are essentially buried alive in a network of underground tunnels built clandestinely by Hamas with money provided by the international community for humanitarian purposes.
Hamas refuses to act according to any accepted norms. Thus, the Red Cross has not been given access to hostages. A shipment of medication which was negotiated by France and was intended for Gazans and for hostages did not reach its destination. Civilians who refused to act as human shields during fighting were summarily executed, as are local LGBTQIA+.
A year has passed since people were snatched from their beds during a religious holiday, and it behooves us to consider an abnormal and inhumane situation, which to my knowledge is beyond the pale in any other conflict situation.
Regardless of their attitude to Israel, do South Africans who support Palestinians believe that Ariel and Kfir are legitimate pawns in the game? If they support indiscriminate violence against civilians, how does that tally with the principled South African struggle? That struggle remains admired worldwide, mostly because it did not include scenes like the violent abduction of two red-haired children and their disheveled mother. If they do not believe this is the right way, what have they done to ensure Kfir's release, to obtain information about Ariel's fate?
Hamas does not surprise me, nor should it surprise anyone familiar with extremist Islamist fundamentalism. But I cannot understand those like the government of South Africa who have a strong relationship with Hamas and yet decline to condemn acts such as the recent cold-blooded murder of six hostages, or fail to use their unique influence in order to bring this inhumane situation to its overdue end.
Tova Herzl, a former Israeli diplomat, was ambassador to South Africa (2001-2003)
