JERUSALEM (BP) – Tiferet Lapidot had returned to Israel to spend the holidays with her family. But Oct. 7, 2023, was the last time her father Ohad Lapidot would see her alive.
“My girl was just at a party, and all of a sudden, she just vanished,” Lapidot told Baptist Press. “For 10 days we didn’t have any idea what’s going on with Tiferet. Is she dead? Did Hamas kidnap her? We didn’t have even a clue.”
Lapidot describes as his worst nightmare the prospect of Hamas holding hostage his 23-year-old daughter.
“But after two days of not hearing a sign from her, it turned to be my hope (that she was in captivity, yet alive),” he said. “And I must tell you, it’s not such a good hope. You can call it hope, but it’s not hope. It’s just better than the alternative.”
Lapidot knows the suffering of Israeli families who have only received the remains of their loved ones in recent weeks during the U.S.-backed Gaza peace deal. He knows the pain they likely suffered, wondering about the condition of their missing family members. To date, Hamas has returned the remains of 26 of the 28 deceased hostages who were still held when the deal was brokered. The remains of two hostages, Thai national Sudthisak Rinthalak and Israeli Ran Gvili, remain missing, the Times of Israel reported Dec. 1, with the anticipated return of an additional hostage that afternoon failing to materialize.
Tiferet was not held hostage. Israeli Defense Forces discovered her body amid the carnage Hamas left on the streets of Kibbutz Be’eri. After 10 days Lapidot, his wife Sarit and Tiferet’s six siblings were able to funeralize Tiferet.
Only then did they observe Sitting Shiva, the traditional and biblically ordained seven-day mourning period after the burial of a loved one, considered in Judaism important for healing. Talmudic scholars note Joseph’s seven days of mourning after the death of his father Jacob, as recorded in Genesis 50:10.
OneFamily, a leading humanitarian outreach to Israeli survivors of terrorism, joined the Lapidots in Sitting Shiva. The weeklong mourning is significant, OneFamily Executive Director Naomi Nussbaum told Baptist Press.
“We want that soul to be able to rest, and that happens once the body is properly buried. The process of Sitting Shiva is kind of therapeutic in nature. It’s a religious tradition that we do, but it’s also very therapeutic to be with friends and family and talk about that life, whether you’re grieving together or celebrating together or back and forth, depending on the day and the moment, as grieving works itself out,” Nussbaum said. “But that’s a very helpful, healthy, therapeutic process.”
Without a body, the surviving family has no closure, Nussbaum said, expressing the importance of Hamas upholding its pledge to return the remains.
“There’s no body to bury. There’s no funeral service with eulogies, which is cathartic and closure. There’s no Sitting Shiva, unless the family just decides on their own to go and do all of those things without the body,” she said. “I think every family will have to make their own call. This will be agony for some.”
As Hamas began returning the remains of the deceased hostages six weeks ago, Israel began mourning as a nation. Most recently, Israelis publicly mourned en masse when Hamas returned the remains of 52-year-old Dror Or, who was killed along with his wife Yonat in the 2023 attack on Be’eri.
OneFamily counselors and caregivers pledged to walk with the Lapidots as they continued to cope with their loss after Sitting Shiva. Lapidot expressed appreciation for One Family’s support.
“They came to my home and they told us, from now on, you have a new family with you. We are going to be together with you and give you all the support that you need,” Lapidot of OneFamily. “And it was amazing because it’s not just in the beginning, when everybody’s surrounding you and everybody supports you. But their support didn’t leave us for a minute, and all down the way, they are with us, supporting us in a variety of ways.
“I cannot imagine how we could deal with this big challenge without One Family. I really cannot understand how we could do it. It’s a big thing.”
OneFamily offers continuing counseling for each family member, as well as retreats and other events to address specific concerns.
In addition, strangers from across Israel joined the Lapidots in Sitting Shiva, Lapidot said.
“During the Shiva, we felt the hug of all the people of Israel who came,” he said. “People from far and wide came from all over the country to support us, to be with us. People understood that it’s not, you know, a regular case of mourning, but it could (have been) anyone of the people of Israel, because it was a terror attack against the people of Israel, not against my daughter.”
Tiferet died trying to protect a friend, Lapidot said, leaving a larger group to be with the friend who she knew was alone during the attack. While the larger group managed to escape, Tiferet and her friend perished.
“I think it’s part of her greatness that in those horrific times, she didn’t just think about herself and saving herself, to be with Ido her boyfriend who can protect her and keep her,” Lapidot said, “but to lose this tunnel vision and to think about other people. I’m so proud of her.”
As Israeli Jews still await the promised Messiah, proclaimed as Jesus in Christianity, Lapidot finds strength in the hope of the Messiah and in the knowledge that God is in control.
“I think that the most important thing for me, that is of comfort, is that the death of Tiferet is not just a free molecule in the air. But this is part of the order. It’s God’s order,” Lapidot said. “We don’t know how it’s going to turn out to the best. We don’t know. We don’t have any idea how it’s going to be. But having the knowledge that the death of Tiferet is part of a big plan that is going to benefit the whole world is indeed some kind of comfort. I can tell you that.”
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