Family members attend the funeral of Abraham Munder, 79, in Nir Oz, Israel, on Aug. 22. He was taken hostage from Israel in a Hamas-led attack last Oct. 7 and his body was one of six recovered by Israeli forces from Gaza this week.
Maya Levin for NPR / Maya Levin
Ruth Nevo sits in the shade of a tree, among rows of white plastic lawn chairs. She gently holds a pale pink flower. The chairs all face a fresh grave, dug into the dry, dusty earth.
This kibbutz in southern Israel is less than two miles from Gaza — the boom of explosions from the ongoing war there can be heard here. It’s one of the communities devastated in the Hamas-led attack last Oct. 7, which Israel says killed around 1,200 people. Another 250 were taken to Gaza as hostages.
The grave is for one of those hostages, 35-year-old Yagev Buchshtab, a sound technician who had a deep passion for music and his 10 pets. His wife, Rimon Buchshtab-Kirsht, was also taken hostage, but was released after 50 days.
Yagev Buchshtab's body was one of six recovered from Gaza by Israeli forces earlier this week.
“He was a very nice person, very unique,” Nevo remembers. She knew him since he was a child; he was the first grandson of her best friend. She says having his body back home is bittersweet.
“It’s a kind of closure. But the idea that he could be back alive — it’s really upsetting,” she says. “There was a possibility before and our government didn’t use it.”
This is a common and growing sentiment among many of the friends and family members of hostages, and Israelis in general: anger that after nearly 11 months of war, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his government have not done enough to get the hostages home alive.
Mourners attend the funeral of Abraham Munder on Aug. 22. Munder was taken hostage from his home in Nir Oz along with his wife Ruti, daughter Keren and 9-year-old grandson Ohad last Oct. 7. His son Roy was killed that day and was reburied alongside his father in the same service.
Maya Levin for NPR / Maya Levin
The recovery of the bodies of Buchshtab and the other five hostages was announced just hours after Secretary of State Antony Blinken met with Netanyahu in Israel on Monday, trying to push forward a cease-fire that would end the war in Gaza and allow for the release of the remaining Israeli hostages. That war has killed more than 40,000 Palestinians, according to Gaza health officials.
The Israeli military says 109 hostages still remain in Gaza and believes at least 34 are dead. U.S. officials estimate about half of the remaining hostages are dead. Many hostage relatives and their supporters believe that time is running out to get back those who remain alive and cease-fire talks set to resume in Cairo in the coming days might be the last chance to make it happen.
Hundreds of mourners file into the cemetery, greeted by Buchshtab's family, including his 28-year-old brother Yuval Buchshtab. He says since his brother was kidnapped, his entire life became devoted to getting him back. He attends protests all over the country.
Yuval Buchshtab also believes that if a cease-fire deal had been signed months ago, his older brother would still be alive.
A mourner holds flowers during Munder's funeral, Aug. 22.
Maya Levin for NPR / Maya Levin
“This could have ended differently if things had happened differently,” Buchshtab says.
He says Israeli intelligence officials shared information with his family that Yagev was alive for several months after being taken captive. Officials told the family they think he died a few months ago.
Buchshtab says even with his brother’s body back home, he won’t stop fighting for the other hostages.
“It is possible that the waste of time during these days will determine the fate of more hostages and more families will end up in the situation we are in,” he warns.
Yagev’s casket is wheeled out, draped with the Israeli flag. It’s lowered into the ground. His wife kneels to touch the casket — a final goodbye. And then men grab shovels, and start filling the hole with dirt.
Some hostages have gotten out of Gaza alive. The biggest number was back in November, when a brief cease-fire deal allowed for 105 hostages, nearly half of all those held, to be released in exchange for 240 Palestinian prisoners and detainees held by Israel.
Mourners attend the funeral of Abraham Munder, 79, in Nir Oz, Israel.
Maya Levin for NPR / Maya Levin
Those watching this week’s Democratic National Convention were reminded about the hostages in Gaza when the parents of 23-year-old Hersh Goldberg-Polin took center-stage in Chicago to plead for a cease-fire that would include the return home of hostages including their son. “There is a surplus of agony on all sides of the tragic conflict in the Middle East. In a competition of pain, there are no winners,” said Jon Polin, wearing a piece of tape on his shirt with the number 320, indicating the days his son has been held captive by Hamas.
A new cease-fire deal is on the table — one that would release all the remaining hostages — based on a three-phase proposal that President Biden laid out in a national address on May 31. But in the more than 11 weeks since then, several rounds of talks have ended at an impasse. Israel and Hamas remain far apart on issues like whether this cease-fire would mean a permanent end to the war, and if Israel can keep forces along the border between Egypt and Gaza.
International mediators, including a team from the United States, will pick up talks in Cairo this weekend, as they try to push Hamas and Israel closer to reaching a deal.
Itay Raviv, whose grandfather was Munder's brother, attends Munder's funeral in Nir Oz, Israel, on Aug. 22. Raviv had been advocating for the release of his family members.
Maya Levin for NPR / Maya Levin
Just down the road from Yagev Buchshtab's funeral, another of the six hostages recovered this week, 79-year-old Abraham Munder, is also being laid to rest. His funeral is in Kibbutz Nir Oz, another community shattered in the Oct. 7 attacks.
Munder’s son was killed that day. His wife, daughter and grandson were taken hostage. They were released in November.
“We had hoped that Abraham would be released as well, but unfortunately he wasn’t,” says Itay Raviv, whose grandfather was Munder's brother.
Raviv is wearing a shirt with Munder’s picture on it, shirts the family had made to wear to protests and meetings with government officials. Raviv has been vocal in both Israel and the U.S., meeting with lawmakers wherever he could in an effort to get Munder out of Gaza.
A boy sits beside a wreath that reads "Kibbutz Nir Oz" at the funeral.
Maya Levin for NPR / Maya Levin
“We kept telling them there’s no time,” he says, “and it proved to be correct.”
When asked who he blames for his great-uncle’s death in Gaza, he says, “Everyone.”
“First of all, of course, the main people to blame are Hamas. They're terrorists. They're my enemy. But of course, my government and the military, they're the ones who were supposed to protect us, and they failed to do that one time after another,” Raviv says.
The service starts. It’s filled with music, Munder's favorite Israeli songs, because he loved to sing. His widow Ruti Munder speaks. And then his sister, Shoshi Ben Ezra, takes the microphone.
“Farewell to my brother,” she begins. “I’m sorry the country you loved so much took 10 months to bring you home.”
And then they lower Abraham Munder into the ground.
Shir David contributed to this report in southern Israel.
Copyright 2024 NPR