German-Israeli woman Shani Louk, who was abducted by Hamas and taken to the Gaza Strip as a hostage, has been confirmed to have died.
Shani's family and the Israeli government separately confirmed that she had died after DNA testing of her body parts. Her full body has not yet been recovered and the family has said they will not conduct any funeral in the absence of her body.
Shani was seen in one of the most-circulated and -condemned videos of a hostage in Gaza. The Hamas personnel paraded her in a semi-naked state in the back of a pick-up truck in Gaza amid celebratory cheering and religious slogans. She appeared to be unconscious in the video and it is not known if she was dead or just unconscious at the time. In the footage authenticated by CNN, Hamas men were also seen assaulting her body.
"In video authenticated and geolocated by CNN, Shani can be seen unconscious in the back of a vehicle, being paraded around Gaza. One gunman, carrying a rocket-propelled grenade, has his leg draped over her waist; the other holds a clump of her dreadlocks. 'Allahu Akbar,' they cheer — 'God is Great', in Arabic," reported CNN.
Shani was at the Supernova Music Festival in the southern desert region of Israel, which became the site of the worst massacre of Hamas on October 7. More than 260 people were killed and dozens were abducted and taken as hostages to Gaza from the festival. Shani was one of them. For days, the family was hopeful that she could be alive, but now the family as well as the Israeli government have confirmed her death.
At least 1,500 attackers from Hamas and other aligned Palestinian groups invaded Israel via land, air, and sea on October 7 as thousands of rockets rained all over Israel. They particularly attacked the Supernova Music Festival and civilian communities in thinly-protected southern Israel, carrying out mass murders at several kibbutzim of Be'eri, Kafr Aza, etc. In all, they killed at least 1,400 and injured around 5,300 in the worst single-day toll on Jews since the Holocaust. Hamas has taken over at least 220 hostages, which has complicated Israeli war efforts as the abducted persons are at risk of executions or getting caught in the crossfire.
Shani was identified from a fragment of the bone of her skull that was tested for DNA, according to the Guardian. When the bone was identified to belong to Shani, it was concluded that she had died as a person could not be alive without this particular bone.
Initially, Shani's family and her partner in Germany were informed that she was alive and was undergoing treatment at a Palestinian facility, but the information turned out to be false.
"We are devastated to share that the death of 23-year-old German-Israeli Shani Luk was confirmed. Shani who was kidnapped from a music festival and tortured and paraded around Gaza by Hamas terrorists, experienced unfathomable horrors," said the Israeli foreign ministry in a statement.
"Initially, Louk’s mother Ricarda said she believed her daughter was alive and being held in a hospital in Gaza, but informed German television on Sunday that her daughter was no longer alive," reported Guardian.
The Times of Israel quoted Ricarda as saying she was relieved at the news of her daughter's death as the alternative of her being alive in the custody of Hamas, a designated terrorist organisation, would have been worse.
"On the one hand, [I feel] sadness, because there is no chance they will return her; on the other hand, we have clarity at least on what happened to her, and it gives us a kind of closure," said Ricarda to media, adding there would not be any funeral as there is no body.
Separately, Shani's father Nissim told Channel 13, "I’m happy. First, that this thing is over, that we know exactly what happened. Because I know where she is, she isn’t lying in some tunnel under Gaza, where every minute we are firing at them and all the earth is shaking and there is dust and it’s impossible to breathe. We know she is dead, we know she didn’t suffer, we also know a minute before the murderers came she was dancing, she was happy, she prayed, she went wild, with all her friends around her, and she had fun."
