The terrible news is confirmed. The Nir Oz kibbutz on the edge of Gaza said Thursday that an Israeli-American hostage died when she was kidnapped on October 7 during the Hamas attack, six days after the announcement of the death of her husband in similar circumstances .
Judith Weinstein Haggai “was injured during the October 7 massacre, and it has now been authorized to publish that she was killed that Saturday,” having succumbed to her injuries, the kibbutz said in a statement. Aged 70, she was presented as the oldest woman held hostage in the Gaza Strip.
According to the kibbutz, she was a “mother of four children and grandmother of seven grandchildren” and worked as an “English teacher for children with special educational needs or those with attention and concentration problems.”
The United States is combative on the hostage issue, assures Joe Biden
The Nir Oz kibbutz announced Wednesday the death of her husband Gadi Haggai, 73, also a hostage in Gaza, in the same circumstances. “This tragic development hurts a lot,” responded US President Joe Biden in a statement, reaffirming that the United States “will not stop mobilizing to bring (the hostages) home”.
Some 250 people were taken hostage during the bloody Hamas attack on Israeli soil on October 7, which left around 1,140 dead, according to an AFP count based on the latest official figures. To date, 129 are still being held in Gaza, according to Israeli authorities.
“There are no words to describe the pain of losing our parents and grandparents during the massacre that took place on our kibbutz,” Judith Weinstein Haggai’s family wrote in a statement.