(Oct. 14, 2026 / JNS)
Three years after the Hamas-led Oct. 7, 2023 invasion of southern Israel, an international conference on forensics opened on Tuesday at the Museum of Tolerance Jerusalem, bringing together experts from Hadassah Medical Center and institutions worldwide to present findings and discuss the unprecedented challenges of identifying victims.
Among the presentations was “Managing the Dead in the October 7 Massacre: Challenges in Forensic Medicine,” delivered by professor Chen Kugel, director of Israel’s National Center of Forensic Medicine.
“When we started the process of identification of the human remains, we noticed that there was a programmed plan on how to eradicate every memory and every remain,” Kugel said.
He added that terrorists used incendiary materials in some locations to destroy bodies, reducing them to calcified bone or bone powder that are extremely difficult to identify because the intense heat destroys DNA, comparing the conditions to those of the Auschwitz crematoria.
“We noticed other methods of killing, execution style, people that were cuffed in their hands and their legs, we saw multiple mechanisms of injuries like persons that were stabbed, shot and burned to death,” said Kugel.
Eyal Eshel, whose daughter Roni, an IDF field observer, was killed at the Nahal Oz military base on Oct. 7, addressed the conference, calling for forensic evidence to be shared with the international community.
“I call from this stage on everyone involved in explaining Israel’s story and the atrocities of Oct. 7 to the world: Take the difficult autopsy reports and share them with the rest of the world so people can understand what happened here and the magnitude of the atrocities committed by Hamas in Gaza,” Eshel said.
“Sometimes all that remains is a single hair, sometimes the tip of a fingernail, and sometimes a lump of charcoal. The entire world needs to see and hear,” he added.
The conference also featured a lecture by Dr. Nurit Bublil, head of the Laboratories Division and Biological Laboratory at the National Center of Forensic Medicine, who described the challenges of analyzing DNA samples exposed to temperatures exceeding 800°C (1,472°F). She noted that in some cases, laboratories received only two bones in a bag and had to rely on advanced techniques and cross-reference multiple sources of information to identify the remains.
Dr. Naama Samet-Rubinstein, a dentist who volunteered to help identify victims at the Shura military base, described the challenges of identifying severely burned bodies, including cases in which even the teeth had been charred. The condition of the remains required advanced imaging techniques, including CT scans, instead of conventional dental X-rays.
Orly Cohen, whose son Amit was murdered at the Nova music festival alongside his partner, Norelle Mansouri, and her sister, Roya, also spoke at the event, expressing gratitude to the professionals who worked under harsh conditions.
“Amid the unimaginable chaos of those days, when thousands of families were caught between hope, fear, and uncertainty, you faced a task that is almost impossible to put into words,” Cohen said. “The certainty you gave us was a gift beyond words. In a world that had fallen apart in an instant, it was the first anchor that allowed us to begin facing reality. Thank you for your dedication, professionalism, sensitivity, and for seeing the human being behind every task.”