An Israeli family of five whose bodies were discovered in each other’s arms after being killed by Hamas militants were buried together in a funeral attended by hundreds of mourners.
Family and friends bid farewell to the Kotz family — a couple and their three children who were gunned down in their home at kibbutz Kfar Azza during the Hamas invasion of southern Israel on October 7.
They were buried side by side in a graveyard 30 miles west of Jerusalem.
Aviv and Livnat Kotz, their daughter, Rotem, and sons, Yonatan and Yiftach, were found dead on a bed embracing each other, a family member said.
The family had moved to Israel from Boston and built the home four years ago at the kibbutz where Aviv had grown up, his wife’s sister, Adi Levy Salma, told the Israeli news outlet Ynet.
“We told her it’s dangerous, but she did not want to move away, as it was her home for life,” Ms Levy Salma said.
With Israel simultaneously in a state of war and mourning, the funeral was one of many being held.
More than 3,400 people have been killed on the Palestinian side, according to the Gaza Health Ministry, and funerals there have been a fixture of daily life, with men running through streets carrying bodies in white sheets and shouting “Allahu akbar”, the Arabic phrase for “God is great”.
In Israel, grieving family members and friends bid farewell to Shiraz Tamam, an Israeli woman who was among at least 260 people gunned down as heavily armed militants stormed an electronic music festival.
Mourners, most wearing black tops and some in sunglasses, wiped away tears and held each other as they said goodbye before her shroud-wrapped body was buried at a cemetery in Holon, in central Israel.
With more than 1,400 killed in Israel and many still unidentified, the funerals will continue for days or longer as the nation tries to cope with the trauma of the attacks that exposed glaring weaknesses in a defence system some thought impenetrable.
