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Matti Friedman: The Family that Never Came Home
Yarden Bibas returned to Israel alive. But his wife Shiri—and their two young children, Kfir and Ariel—tragically came home in coffins. (AP Photo/Maya Alleruzzo)
The deaths of Shiri, Ariel, and Kfir Bibas were too unbearable to believe. Israelis couldn’t accept it until we had no other choice.
By Matti Friedman
02.20.25 — Israel
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Israeli television did not broadcast the ceremony that took place in Gaza this morning. As masked terrorists put four black coffins on a stage in Khan Younis, the channels instead showed photos of the people inside them, taken before the war began—including of an Israeli mother and two redheaded boys, laughing on a couch, picking fruit in an orchard, still believing they’re safe.

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Matti Friedman
Matti Friedman is a Jerusalem-based columnist for The Free Press. He’s the author of four nonfiction books, of which the most recent is Who by Fire: War, Atonement, and the Resurrection of Leonard Cohen.
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