Yafit, the mother of Staff Sergeant Oriya Eimalek Goshen, a fighter in the Givati Reconnaissance Unit who fell in January 2024 in the Gaza Strip, shared a painful revelation during a Memorial Day ceremony at Beit Yad LaBanim.
She said her son and his comrade, Staff Sergeant Ori Gerbi, were killed during Operation “Red Heart” — a mission aimed at rescuing the Bibas family: Shiri and her two young children, Ariel and Kfir, who had been kidnapped during the October 7 massacre.
According to her account, only after the operation did it become clear that the mother and her children had already been murdered roughly a month after October 7, turning the mission into a tragic effort carried out without knowing the devastating truth.