She criticizes how quickly the fate of the hostages, including German citizens held by a terrorist organization, disappeared from public discussion.

By i24 News and Algemeiner

More than two years after the October 7 attack, the grief of Ricarda Louk remains as raw as ever.

The mother of Shani Louk, the Israeli-German woman murdered by Hamas terrorists during the Nova music festival massacre, says time has not healed the wound.

In an interview with the German Jewish newspaper Jüdische Allgemeine, she speaks of enduring pain and her distress over what she sees as Germany’s fading memory of that day.

“Time softens the pain for a moment, but then everything brings me back to October 7,” she says. “I am shocked all over again by the realization that Shani is gone.”

At times, she admits, denial creeps in. “I feel as though she is still traveling abroad, that she will come home one day and knock on the door. Then the images return, of the terrorists with their rifles, and reality sets in.”

Shani Louk’s abduction and murder resonated far beyond Israel. Images showing her lifeless body in the back of a pickup truck, surrounded by Hamas fighters, spread across the globe.

Taken by an Associated Press photographer and later awarded prizes, the photographs are permanently etched in her mother’s mind.

“I will carry these images with me forever,” Ricarda Louk says, recalling as well the moment her son collapsed after seeing the video.

Shani Louk’s body was repatriated by the Israeli army in May 2024 so she could be buried. Yet her mother feels that Germany never fully confronted the magnitude of what happened.

She criticizes how quickly the fate of the hostages, including German citizens held by a terrorist organization, disappeared from public discussion.

“Why didn’t Germany exert more pressure on Hamas?” she asks, convinced that stronger international pressure might have helped bring about a ceasefire sooner.

Ricarda Louk also expresses anger at what she views as morally troubling comparisons between victims of terrorism and civilian casualties of war.

She points to reactions in Germany following a deadly terrorist attack in Jerusalem, where civilians were shot on a bus, noting that the attack was minimized by arguments about higher casualty figures elsewhere.

Despite her grief, she remains determined to preserve her daughter’s memory. Shani, she says, believed deeply in humanity and often said that “there are no bad people, only people who are suffering.”

Open-minded and unconcerned with nationality or religion, she embodied an ideal of tolerance her mother hopes will survive.

“I still believe that something good can emerge from these horrors,” Ricarda Louk says, urging young people in Germany to think independently, seek reliable information, and resist slogans, hatred, and misinformation circulating on social media.

The post Oct. 7th victim Shani Louk’s mother: ‘Sometimes, I feel like she’s abroad, then I remember’ appeared first on World Israel News.

Her body was soon seen in a video, slung across the back of a pickup truck, surrounded by terrorists and paraded through Gaza.

By The Algemeiner and Reuters

German-Israeli Shani Louk’s father says that finally laying his daughter to rest will be a gift after her body was recovered from Gaza, months after she was killed in Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack on southern Israel.

Louk, a 23-year-old tattoo artist, was celebrating with friends at the Nova music festival just inside Israel before it was attacked by terrorists from the Palestinian terror group.

Her body was soon seen in a video, slung across the back of a pickup truck, surrounded by terrorists and paraded through Gaza.

On Friday, the Israeli military informed her parents, Nissim and Ricarda Louk, that their daughter’s body had been found by Israeli commandos in Gaza. Nissim Louk said that to be sure, he had viewed photos.

“We also saw the tattoos on her hands,” he said on Saturday. “Now she will have her own place next to us and we can go there whenever we want. And she can rest.”

He said the funeral will be held on Sunday, which is Ricarda Louk’s birthday.

“I think Shani said ‘let’s give my mother a birthday present and let’s go back and be close to her,’” he added.

Having Shani’s grave nearby would be a comfort, said Ricarda Louk.

“Maybe we’ll find more peace,” she said.

Nissim Louk said there was also solace knowing Shani was doing what she loved best before she died and probably did not suffer.

She was pronounced dead by Israeli authorities at the end of October, based on findings in the area of the Nova rave, where more than 360 people were shot, bludgeoned or burned to death.

Videos of a smiling Shani at the party, before the attack, surfaced in the following weeks.

“She was dancing the whole night. She was so happy,” Nissim Louk said. “She never thought that there is evil in the world because she was a free spirit. She saw it only for a couple of seconds.”

Around 1,200 people were killed and more than 250 abducted in the Hamas-led attack. Israel responded by launching a military offensive to try to eradicate Hamas that is now in its eight month.

Ricarda Louk said she was pained by what she sees as ignorance and misinformation displayed at some U.S. campus protests against Israel‘s war in Gaza.

“It’s horrible for us to see,” she said. “We can tell you from our own experience. We lost our daughter in this massacre.”

“There is no resistance that can justify what happened here,” she said.

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Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the losses are ‘heartbreaking.’

By Andrew Bernard, JNS

Israel recovered the bodies of 22-year-old Shani Louk, 28-year-old Amit Bouskila and 56-year-old Itzhak Gelerenter during an overnight operation in Rafah, in southern Gaza, according to multiple official Israeli sources.

The three hostages, all of whom attended the Nova music festival, were killed on Oct. 7, according to the Israel Defense Forces. Their bodies have now returned to Israel.

“The bodies of the abductees were recovered during a joint operation by the IDF forces and the Shin Bet’s operational unit, based on information that also emerged in the Shin Bet’s investigations of terrorists arrested in the Gaza Strip and under the intelligence guidance of the Captives and Missing Persons Command of the Intelligence Division,” the IDF wrote in Hebrew.

It added that medical officials at the National Institute of Forensic Medicine and the Ministry of Health identified the bodies. “IDF representatives notified their families during the day,” the Israeli military said. “The IDF and Shin Bet share in the grief of the families at this difficult time.” (The Shin Bet is the Israel Security Agency.)

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the losses are “heartbreaking.”

“My wife Sara and I grieve with the families; all of our hearts are with them in their hour of heavy sorrow,” he stated.

“We will return all of our hostages, the living and the deceased alike. I commend our brave forces whose determined action has returned the sons and daughters to their own border.”

Lt. Col. (res.) Peter Lerner, an IDF spokesman, wrote that the moment was “bittersweet” and “not just about closure. It is about justice and humanity.”

“When we bring our fallen home, we reaffirm our commitment to these principles. We send a clear message to Hamas and the world that we will not abandon our own, that we will stand by each other in life and in death,” he said. “These are our values.”

“In these moments of heartbreak and loss, we also find hope. Hope in the determination of our forces, the unwavering spirit of our men and women, and in the enduring power of our resolve,” Lerner said.

“We will bring our loved ones back. Shani, Itzik and Amit will be laid to rest in the soil they called home, and in doing so, we will honor their memory and reaffirm our commitment to bring back all of our hostages,” he added.

A dual German-Israeli national, Louk was declared dead in late October after the Israeli ZAKA victim-identification team recovered a fragment of her skull. The fates of the other two victims were previously unknown.

Photographs and videos of Louk’s body being taken into Gaza were among the most harrowing and controversial images of Oct. 7.

Videos showed a half-naked woman, seemingly unconscious and face-down in the back of a pickup truck in Gaza filled with armed men. Louk’s mother identified her in the video based on her tattoos and dyed hair.

In April, U.S. and Israeli officials condemned the University of Missouri after its Reynolds Journalism Institute awarded the Associated Press and photographer Ali Mahmud a first-place prize for his image of Louk’s corpse.

“This photo captures Hamas terrorists desecrating the body of Shani Louk, may her soul rest in peace,” wrote Danny Danon, a member of the Knesset.

“Yet the AP news agency proudly received an award for it. Their continued pride in their photographers’ ‘work’ and involvement in the atrocities is shameful.”

That photo and other images taken by Gaza-based photographers and published by news outlets on Oct. 7 raised questions about the ethics of recording images of atrocities and accompanying gunmen during an ongoing terrorist attack.

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