DEVELOPING STORY: Avigail Idan, a four-year-old American, has been freed by Hamas. She was part of Sunday’s hostage release. Her birthday was on Friday.
Avigail’s mother was shot and killed while she was cradled in her father’s arms. He was shot and killed as well. NBC News says he fell on top of his daughter. She crawled away, covered in his blood, and found refuge with neighbors.
Avigail’s great-aunt spoke exclusively to NBC News about the slaughter of her family.
Liz Hirsh Naftali, the great-aunt of 3-year-old Abigail Mor Idan, revealed that the little girl’s parents were killed in their home at the Kfar Aza kibbutz. Abigail was in her father’s arms when a Hamas gunman shot him. He fell on top of her. Abigail then “crawled out from under her father’s body … full of his blood,” Hirsh Naftali said.
The girl ran over to a neighbor’s house and sheltered with that family in a bomb shelter. “The last thing we learned was that somebody saw [a] terrorist taking this mother, her three kids and Abigail out of the kibbutz,” Hirsh Naftali said. “That’s all we know.”
Abigail’s older brothers survived the terror attack. “They saw their mother murdered. They saw their father murdered. These kids know their parents are gone,” Hirsh Naftali said. “What do you say to these kids? You give them love. You give them everything.”
NBC News
Avigail and her siblings — Michael, 9, and Amelia, 6, both of whom survived the violence — will be raised by Naftali.
“I have a 3-year-old niece who has no parents anymore,” she told The New York Times. “I’m her voice now.”
May there be no mercy for those who committed this act of evil. How many of us will pledge to pray for this precious, young child who is now an orphan?
President Biden told reporters there is no word on the remaining American hostages or what price Hamas will pay for their terrorist acts.
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