2023-12-15 12:53:02
Thousands came this morning (Friday) to escort the late Aden Zakaria, who was abducted from the Nova party near Ra’im on October 7, and apparently murdered by Hamas. Zakaria’s body was recovered from the Gaza Strip by IDF forces last Tuesday. She was buried in the cemetery in Kibbutz Palmahim, exactly on her 28th birthday.
A long traffic jam stretched outside the kibbutz to the cemetery. Despite mid-December, the sun is blazing and hot. Below, in front of the beach, the elves gather to bury a beloved friend, daughter, sister. The atmosphere is tense, many tears fall. Many young people, some in uniform, gather near the coffin, place roses on it and cry.
Zohar, Eden’s father, knocks on the coffin in anger, then repents, caresses him, cups his face in his hand and cries. He hugs his son and daughter, their faces are similar to Eden’s face that is printed large on the poster demanding to return home. The brothers are silent, holding the hands of their father and mother, surrounded by the broken cries of their family members and friends. It is a sad and angry companion, angry and hard, under a very blue sky and sea. In the background, explosions are heard from the nearby air force base.
The funeral of the late Aden Zachariah (Photo: Hadas Yom Tov)
the mother, Orin Gantz, who waited for Eden and fought for her release until the day of the bitter announcement, paid tribute to her: “For 28 years you never stopped teaching me about life. They will never be able to be like you, even in a million years.” She said that Aden was born on December 15, 1995, the same date she was buried. “It’s your birthday today, you’re 28 years old. We were supposed to celebrate in some restaurant, with a big sweet cake. But today your celebration was interrupted. Congratulations, my love.”
She explained her choice to bury her daughter in Palmahim, near the beach. “Eden is a child of freedom, of spaces. She cannot be buried in a city cemetery. I chose a place for her near the sea, near the sun, in freedom. This is Eden’s place, after you were forced to stay in a dark tunnel for two months.”
Eden Zakaria’s funeral, near Palmahim beach. The mother, Orin Gantz: “I chose a place for her near the sea, near the sun, in freedom” (Photo: Hadas Yom Tov)
“You came back to me whole. With abundant hair and the face of an angel,” Gantz said, thanking the soldiers who rescued her daughter and making it clear that the struggle is not over. “Soldiers sacrificed their lives to return my beloved daughter to me, and that is the difference between us and them. My war is not over, for many days I waited for you, and we will continue to wait for all the abductees.”
On the seventh of October, Zacharia was already on her way home from the party, when terrorists shot the car she was driving near the rebels. Apparently she lost consciousness and was kidnapped while she was alive. Her partner Ofek Kimchi, who was driving the car, was murdered. Zakaria was considered missing for 19 days, until her family was informed that there was an indication that she had been kidnapped. Last Tuesday, her family was informed, while they were on a delegation in Tokyo as part of the efforts to free the abductees, that her body had been identified and retrieved from Gaza.
The late Aden Zakaria (Photo: Social Networks, Section 27A of the Copyright Law)
The Knesset Speaker also attended the funeral Amir Ohanaand the singer Eliad Sing some of Eden’s favorite songs. Zachariah was buried next to three graves from Kibbutz Bari, in a special section in the cemetery in Palmahim.
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