Twin of soldier Hadar Goldin, killed in Gaza in 2014, has hopes for his return, even as Hamas stalls

Tzur Goldin, 34, the twin brother of Hadar Goldin, a Givati Brigade officer killed in combat in 2014 whose body is still held captive in Gaza, said he is guardedly optimistic that his brother’s body will be released during the current ceasefire, even with the recent violations committed by Hamas.

Alongside the hostages captured on October 7, Hamas also holds the body of Goldin and is required to return it under the terms of the truce. But so far, the terror group has been stalling.

“We’re hopeful,” said Goldin in an interview with The Times of Israel. “We believe [US special envoy Steve] Witkoff, mainly Witkoff and the administration. We’ve had signals from them and [US Secretary of State Marco] Rubio that they have made a full commitment to enforce what they announced, which is to secure the release of all the hostages.”

“The White House wants the peace process in the Middle East,” said Goldin. “They want to get from stage A to stage B.”

According to the ceasefire deal that went into effect on October 10, Hamas was committed to returning all remaining hostages, the living and the fallen captives.

All 20 living hostages were released on October 13, followed by the slow, protracted release of, so far, 15 of the 28 bodies of deceased hostages held in Gaza.

A casket handed over by Hamas on Monday night to Israel contained the partial remains of Ofir Tzarfati, a hostage whose body was recovered by the military in early December 2023.

Hamas staged a fake “discovery” of Tzarfati’s remains in eastern Gaza City in front of the Red Cross, and has not returned the bodies of the remaining 13 dead hostages still held in the Gaza Strip, including Goldin.

There can’t be a narrative of normalizing the situation of fallen hostages. That would lead us into the abyss

Goldin, whose family has been fighting for over a decade to secure the release of Hadar’s remains, said that while he is optimistic, there is a fear that efforts to free the hostages will ease up now that the living have returned home.

“We’re petrified that now there’s a celebration for the release of the living hostages, but there can’t be a narrative of normalizing the situation of fallen hostages,” said Goldin. “That would lead us into the abyss.”

Goldin said the US administration understands the gravity of retrieving bodies according to Jewish tradition, and also sees it as a matter of countering terrorism.

“The US cannot allow a situation in which Hamas uses terrorism to intimidate families, like my family, and let that go without closure,” he said. “Trump is 100 percent committed to it.”

Furthermore, said Goldin, Hamas unequivocally knows the location of all 13 remaining hostages in Gaza.

Goldin, a Hebrew University-educated lawyer currently attending the Kennedy School at Harvard University, has been in Washington, DC, for the last few weeks, advocating for the ceasefire and the release of all hostages.

It was Tzur Goldin who established the Goldin Foundation in 2015, the organization representing the families of Israel’s hostages held in Gaza.

At the time, there were four hostages held in Gaza — Hadar Goldin; Oron Shaul, a soldier also killed in 2014, whose body was seized by Hamas; and two living Israeli civilians, Avera Mengistu, who crossed into Gaza in 2014, and Hisham al-Sayed, who entered Gaza in 2015.

Mengistu and al-Sayed were released in an earlier ceasefire, and IDF troops recovered Shaul’s body.

The Goldin Foundation became the basis of the Hostages Forum, the ad hoc organization that has represented the families of hostages since October 7, 2023.

The family foundation’s New York branch concentrated on advocacy with the US administration, while the international branch focused on the human rights angle. In 2016, the organization established a public struggle for the hostages in Israel, including weekly rallies and ad campaigns still visible throughout the country.

In the months after the Hamas terrorist attack of October 7, Goldin, by then an associate at leading law firm Herzog, Fox & Neeman specializing in corporate and commercial transactions, was awarded the Fulbright fellowship to pursue his master’s degree in public policy at the Kennedy School at Harvard University.

Now, however, he said, he is focused on Washington and making sure there is no repeat scenario of 2014, when Operation Protective Edge ended and Israel and the US put aside the issue of fallen and deceased hostages.

“That found us for nine and a half years quite alone on that front,” he said.

The family was alone in their struggle until October 7, 2023, when they were joined by 251 other hostages’ families.

A repeated refrain by hostages’ families, particularly those whose loved ones’ bodies were among the 15 released in the last few weeks, is their newly discovered awareness of what the Goldin family has suffered for the last 11 years.

His family wants this nightmare to end, said Goldin.

Now, said Goldin, the US and Israeli governments have to pressure Hamas to comply with the first stage of the ceasefire agreement, given the terrorist organization’s violations of the ceasefire.

He referred to mechanisms such as sanctions, diplomatic relations, and, if necessary, IDF strikes in Gaza.

“If the remaining hostages won’t be released in the context of this war, they won’t be released,” said Goldin. “Instead of one Hadar Goldin, there will be 13 Hadar Goldins.”