Israeli Soldier Freed and German Hostage Confirmed Dead in Hamas Attack in Gaza

2023-10-30 16:58:33
Foreign attack on Israel

Israeli soldier freed during ground operation in Gaza

Status: 6:50 p.m. | Reading time: 4 minutes

A photo of Shani Louk seen on her aunt’s cell phone. Now it is clear: the 22-year-old did not survive Hamas’ attack on Israel

Source: dpa/David Pichler

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The Israeli army rescued a hostage from Hamas during an operation in the Gaza Strip. Meanwhile, the death of the kidnapped 22-year-old German Shani Louk has been confirmed. In an interview with WELT, Israel’s President Yitzchak Herzog describes the circumstances – and it becomes clear.

An Israeli soldier has been freed during ground operations in the Gaza Strip, according to the military. The woman kidnapped by Hamas on October 7 is in good condition and has already met her family, the army said in an X-post on Monday. Accordingly, the liberation was at night. In a picture distributed by the military, she was seen in the arms of her family.

At the weekend, Israel’s army ushered in a new phase in the war once morest Hamas, which rules in the Gaza Strip. In addition to massive air strikes, Israeli troops also expanded operations on the ground. According to media reports, they are said to have advanced around three kilometers into the Gaza Strip.

Terrorists from Hamas, which rules the Gaza Strip, carried out a massacre of civilians in Israel on October 7th. More than 1,400 people died during and in the following days. According to the Israeli army, at least 239 others were kidnapped into the Gaza Strip, including several Germans. The army says it believes most of the hostages are still alive.

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However, the German Shani Nicole Louk, who was taken hostage by Hamas during its major attack on Israel, is dead. Israeli President Yitzchak Herzog confirmed this in an interview with WELT reporter Paul Ronzheimer: “Her skull has been found. “It means that these barbaric, sadistic animals simply chopped off her head while they were attacking, torturing and killing Israelis.” It is a great tragedy and he expresses his deep condolences to her family.

Around 40 bodies have still not been identified, said Herzog: “What we saw on the border between Gaza and Israel goes far beyond a pogrom. We saw a slaughterhouse. We saw the blood flowing in the streets.” We saw the “most terrible tragedies imaginable.”

“Her skull was found”

The German-Israeli Shani Louk has been missing since the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7th. According to Yitzhak Herzog, the Israeli president, she was found dead. In an interview with Paul Ronzheimer, the head of state expressed his condolences to the bereaved families.

Which: WELT / Paul Ronzheimer

The Israeli Foreign Ministry announced on X that the 22-year-old’s body had been found and identified. The Foreign Ministry wrote in its statement that Shani was kidnapped from the “SuperNova” music festival by Hamas terrorists, tortured and paraded in the Gaza Strip: “She experienced unimaginable horrors.” Our thoughts and prayers “are with Shani’s friends and family this unimaginable nightmare”.

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The 22-year-old’s family also confirmed Shani Louk’s death. Her sister Adi Louk wrote on Instagram that it was “with great sadness” to announce the death of Shani Louk. Mother Ricarda Louk had previously announced that her daughter’s body had not yet been found, but that a sliver of a skull bone had been found and a DNA sample was taken from it. The parents had provided the necessary comparison material a long time ago.

“At least she didn’t suffer,” hopes the mother

The mother now assumes that her daughter has been dead since October 7th – she may have been killed by a shot in the skull during the terrorist attack. The news is terrible. But it’s good to have certainty now. “At least she didn’t suffer,” Ricarda Louk said.

Ricarda Louk at a press conference in Tel Aviv, behind her a photo of her daughter Shani Nicole

Those: AP/Maya Alleruzzo

Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier condoled the mother: “The cruelty of your daughter’s murder horrifies us all,” wrote Steinmeier. “Everywhere in Germany people feel for you. Together we stand once morest hatred and terror.”

When asked regarding Herzog’s statements that Louk had been beheaded, his spokesman said: “The fact that a significant part of her skull was found triggered fears that she had been beheaded.”

Shani Louk was last seen at the SuperNova music festival in Israel’s Negev Desert and was apparently kidnapped in the Islamist Hamas attack on October 7, 2023.

Orly Louk, Shani Louk’s aunt, described the dramatic scenes at the music festival as follows: “She was at a party, in the desert, in no man’s land. There she danced with a group of people. (…) There was shooting and the partygoers were chased. The young people were running, hiding, as far as I know. You can see what happened in the videos.” Pictures and videos that subsequently circulated on the Internet showed the young woman’s lifeless body on a pickup truck.

Initially, Shani Louk’s family, some of whom live in Baden-Württemberg, assumed that the young woman was seriously injured but was alive and in the Gaza Strip. The family had been campaigning for the release of all hostages since the attack.

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