TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) — Hamas on Thursday released the bodies of four Israeli hostages, said to include a mother and her two children who have long been feared dead and had come to embody the nation’s agony following the Oct. 7, 2023, attack.

The ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas hit a dark point Thursday, as the first hostages returned to Israel in caskets rather than alive.Ha

Hamas handed over the bodies of Israeli infant Kfir Bibas and his four-year-old brother Ariel, the two youngest captives taken by Hamas in their October 7, 2023 attack and among the most potent symbols of the trauma inflicted that day.