Δ

Thanks for contacting us. We’ve received your submission.

An Israeli father who has been held captive by Hamas for over two months may not know his wife and two daughters were murdered by Hamas, a grieving relative told The Post.

Eli Sharabi, 51, was abducted from Kibbutz Be’eri alongside his brother, 53-year-old Yossi Sharabi, during Hamas’ terror attack on Oct. 7, the brothers’ niece Shira Matalon said.

Eli’s wife, Lianne, and his daughters – Noiya, 16, and Yahel, 13 – were “brutally murdered” in the attack, Shira explained.

“I don’t think Eli knows that he lost his family, now we are the closest family he has,” Shira, 17, lamented.

“We are very worried about how he’s going to take it. I can only hope for the best, I can only hope that he’s strong and he can go through all of that and still be able to live his life. First, we need him back,” she said of her uncle’s possible response to his unimaginable loss.

“I believe in Eli…I believe that he can manage to deal with all of this and we owe it to him that we bring him home, so that he can be with the rest of his family, the ones that are left,” she added.

On the morning of Hamas’ attack, Shira herself was with her parents and brother at their home in a city in southern Israel, away from the kibbutz.

As the family hid in their own safe room, they were flooded with horrifying updates from Eli, Yossi, and their families while terrorists stormed the kibbutz, Shira recalled.

She is still haunted by one of Lianne’s last messages, which read “‘we’ve never in our lives been so afraid.’”

“I can’t even think about all the things they must have been through,” Shira said tearfully.

“I know that Yossi…he held the safe room door so the terrorists wouldn’t come in the safe, but he didn’t manage to do it…eventually they broke into the safe rooms,” she explained.

“I can’t even think about all the things they must have been through,” Shira said tearfully.

“[Hamas] shot their dog immediately,” she added.

While Eli lost his wife and daughters, brother Yossi’s family were able to escape, Shira said.

“[His wife and daughters] needed to go and hide for like seven hours so that they would not be killed by the terrorists. They were such heroes, and they managed to survive this, and he doesn’t know it,” she lamented.

Speaking to the Times of Israel in mid-November, Yossi’s wife Nira said “life stopped” for her and her daughters while her husband remains a hostage.

“I’m not sure they can even breathe fresh air or be exposed to sunlight again, they must be so alone and so afraid,” Shira told The Post of the relatives’ concerns about what Eli and Yossi are enduring in Gaza.

Shira spoke to The Post during a trip to New York, where she and a few other relatives – including one of Yossi’s daughters – spoke to the Red Cross to ask for more help returning her uncles from Hamas’ clutches in Gaza.

“I came to New York [this week] to speak in the name of Noiya and Yahel, to bring their father home,” she said of her late cousins.