A freed hostage has revealed that she saw the father of Kfir Bibas – the baby taken captive by Hamas – in a cage while she was in a tunnel under Gaza.
Adina Moshe, who was released from Hamas captivity in a deal after 49 days in Gaza, said on Thursday that she saw hostages Yarden Bibas and Ofer Kalderon from Kibbutz Nir Oz in cages.
Moshe revealed the bravery of the two men; “they had confronted Hamas” she recounted, as she described the cage they held in.
In an interview with the Israel Defence Force radio station, the 72-year-old said: "There were cages there. I approached, and it was completely dark. I asked, 'Why are you in a cage?' and they said they didn’t know. When I asked if they had confronted Hamas, it turned out they had. During the abduction, they had confronted Hamas.
"I took a few steps backward, slowly, thinking: 'Let's see if the Hamas guards look away for a moment.' Ofer and Yarden told me their story. I immediately started thinking about what I could do with this information later on."
Two days later, Moshe said she asked the commander of the Hamas unit guarding them if she could speak to other hostages from Kibbutz Nir Oz.
"I told him I heard people speaking Hebrew and that they were from Nir Oz. He asked, 'From Nir Oz? How do you know?' I told him to bring them to join us. Two days later, he brought them to us for an hour, then returned them to the cage. The next day, he brought them back for two hours."
Moshe was asked by the father of two if he knew what happened to his wife, Shiri, and their sons, Kfir, who turned one in captivity, and Ariel who turned five last month.
The heartrending image of Shiri Bibas with baby Kfir and Ariel being abducted by Hamas terrorists on October 7
The released hostage, who saw her husband murdered on October 7, explained Bibas’s account of Hamas’s attack: “He said he left the safe room and confronted the Hamas terrorists. Shiri and the children stayed inside. He told us, 'I really hope they didn’t get to them because the terrorists in my house captured me and took me to the meeting point at the kibbutz, and from there, they took me to Khan Younis.'
“He believed that for a long time. At some point, I asked Hamas if Shiri and the children were with them. They told me it would take time to find out. I established a good and fair relationship with Hamas from the beginning, understanding it would be in our best interest."
The Bibas family have become an iconic symbol of October 7 – known for the gruesome footage of their kidnapping which showed mother Shiri holding her two children as terrorists took the family hostage.
Last November, Hamas reported that it “no longer has” the Bibas boys, the youngest hostages kidnapped by the terror group. There have been no public reports of sightings of the children in the Gaza Strip, but many still hold onto the hope that the red-headed siblings can be rescued.
In December, the Bibas father was forced to appear in a propaganda film for the terror group in which he was told that his family had been killed and as he wept he blamed Israel for their deaths.
Ofer Calderon was taken hostage with his children Sahar (17) and Erez (12). Sahar and Erez were released after 52 days in captivity in Gaza.
Moshe told army radio that Shin Bet officials had questioned her about the tunnel network.
“They didn't know much about the tunnels. She asked me to describe them, and I realised it's not something you can simply see – it's about how it feels. I told her it's an enormous, complex maze beneath the entire Gaza Strip."
"When I left the hospital, they sent a Shin Bet engineer to see me. She wanted me to draw the tunnel layout. I explained I was not an artist and offered a verbal description, but she insisted on a visual representation. I tried my best to illustrate it, but it's an almost infinite network. I detailed everything – the phone lines, power supplies, booby traps, confinement areas – things they couldn't have imagined existed."
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