Body of Thai worker Sudthisak Rinthalak returned to Israel

Only one slain hostage is left in Gaza, Master Sgt. Ran Gvili of the police counter-terror unit.

By Batya Jerenberg, World Israel News

The body of slain hostage Sudthisak Rinthalak has been officially identified after the Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) found it in the northern Gaza city of Beit Lahiya Wednesday and transferred it to Israel, the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) announced Thursday morning.

“The Coordinator for Prisoners and Missing Persons, Brig. Gen. (res.) Gal Hirsch, informed Sudthisak’s family that arrangements for his return for burial in his homeland will be carried out in coordination with the Embassy of Thailand in Israel, and that the Government of Israel shares in the deep grief of the Rinthalak family, of the Thai people, and of all the families of the deceased hostages,” the PMO stated.

Rinthalak, 42, had been working in the orchards of Kibbutz Be’eri when PIJ and Hamas forces stormed the community on Oct. 7, 2023.

He was murdered along with 100 other residents and was one of the 32 hostages, both alive and dead, whom the invaders took into Gaza from the kibbutz.

Rinthalak’s family has been waiting more than two years for news of him, having only seen a video of him being kidnapped.

His brother, Thepporn, said in an interview with Army Radio that getting his remains back was “very important” to the family, “so at least we will have some part of Sudthisak.”

With tears in his eyes, Thepporn added, “I sent him to Israel. I gave him money so he could make the journey…. When you lose someone so close, you still worry for them, still want them to be at peace, even after they’re gone.”

His elderly father, Thong Ma, spoke of missing his son, saying that he prayed that Sudthisak would return “while I’m still alive.”

He had last spoken to Sudthisak two days before the massacre, when his son told him he wanted to come home for a visit.

There is now only one hostage remaining in Gaza, Master Sgt. Ran Gvili, who was killed while defending Kibbutz Alumim from Hamas terrorists on Oct. 7.

Gvili, a member of the police counter-terror Yasam unit, was on medical leave with a broken shoulder when the invasion began, but immediately put on his uniform to head 57 kilometers east to the Gaza envelope.

His father recounted last month to Ynet that when he asked his son, “Where do you think you’re going?” Gvili answered, “What do you think? Do you think that my friends will fight alone? I’m going to help them.”

He first rescued several partygoers among the thousands fleeing the Nova festival, the site where Hamas forces murdered more than 360 of their nearly 1,200 victims of the day.

He then led a seven-man team of Yasam fighters and an undercover officer who fought off a tide of Hamas forces at Alumim, preventing the terrorists from reaching the community.

Reacting on Facebook to the news of Rinthalak’s return, Gvili’s mother, Talik, wrote that her son was “the first to go out and the last to come back – we won’t stop until you return.”

The Tikva Forum of hostage families demanded, “For every day that Rani does not return home, Hamas must pay a price – a heavy price. We must not make peace with this, and we must not allow Hamas to torture us.”