Family of Baby Brothers Abducted by Hamas Posts Moving Video as Their Fates Remain Unclear

As the fate of the young Bibas brothers in Hamas custody remained unclear, heartbreaking video of the two young Israeli boys meeting for the first time was released by their family on Monday.

The footage shows 4-year-old Ariel meeting his baby brother Kfir, now 10 months old, for the first time, hugging the newborn as he sleeps inside his carrier.

“Who is that? That’s your brother. Your little brother," a woman who appears to be the boys' mother, Shiri, tells Ariel.

“Do you want to pet him?”

Ariel is all smiles, in the video, as he is seen caressing Kfir's foot.

The Bibas family – including Shiri and her husband Yarden – were all abducted by Hamas from Kibbutz Nir Oz near the Gaza border during the terror group's Oct. 7 raid on Israel.

But even as 110 women and children among the estimated 237 total hostages taken that day were released last week under a temporary ceasefire deal, the Bibases remained in Gaza and their status and condition are unclear.

Hamas claimed on Wednesday that the two boys and their mother were killed by an Israeli airstrike – claims that Israeli officials said remain under investigation.

Last week, Hamas released a hostage video showing Yarden weeping as he was told his family was killed.

Hamas has lied or misled about the fate of hostages in the past. Captive Hanna Katzir, 76, who they'd said died in an Israeli air strike, was among the hostages Hamas released last week, alive and relatively well.

According to YNet, an Israeli news outlet, video of the two young boys meeting for the first time was made public by Shiri's cousin in hopes that it would increase international pressure to secure their release.

"We are trying to maintain optimism and a certain hope that they are there waiting for us and are still alive despite the rumors," the cousin, Jimmy Miller, told the publication.

The video begins with the person filming the footage mentioning how family friends made a "congratulations" sign for Kfir's birth.

The friends are apparently the Cunios, a family of four who was also abducted from the kibbutz by Hamas. Three of the four of them were among the hostages released last week.

In the video, a door then swings open to reveal Shiri and Kfir, who is peacefully asleep on a sofa.

Smiling, Ariel sits down at his brother's side, blissfully unaware of what the future holds.

Miller told YNet that the hostages who have been released so far did not know anything about the conditions of the Bibas family.

"We hope that they are hiding them somewhere and that we will hear good news in the near future," Miller said. "We saw that Yarden is alive, it gave us great hope in our hearts that he will also return to us."