New details from the interrogation of a Gaza terrorist have shed light on how the body of IDF soldier Staff Sgt. Oron Shaul Hy”d was concealed in Gaza for more than a decade before intelligence gathered during the current war led to its recovery. The revelations were first reported by Kan News.

The terrorist, Ibrahim Hilo, a resident of Gaza, was questioned by Israel Police’s Lahav 433 major crimes unit and the Shin Bet. According to the report, Hilo initially denied any involvement in the affair but later broke down during questioning and provided investigators with extensive details.

Hilo told interrogators that during Operation Protective Edge in 2014, shortly after Oron Shaul was killed and his body was abducted, the commander of Hamas’s Shati Battalion contacted him and informed him that he was being entrusted with a “deposit.”

According to Hilo, he asked what the “deposit” was and was told it was the body of an Israeli soldier.

“I asked what the deposit was, he said the body of a soldier. He arrived with a jeep and told me, ‘Take the jeep, put the deposit in the freezer, and afterward leave the jeep in a square in Gaza with the key inside.'”

Hilo testified that he lived on the fifth floor of a building while a refrigeration business operated on the ground floor. It was there, he said, that Oron Shaul’s body was stored for years.

“I locked the freezer and kept the key with me. Only me and Abu Rashad (the commander of the Shati Battalion) knew about the freezer and the key.”

According to the investigation, Hamas operatives periodically visited the site over the years to ensure that the location remained secure and that the body was still being kept there. Hilo claimed that only a small number of individuals were aware of the arrangement and insisted that even members of his own family had no knowledge of it.

Investigators challenged that account. During the interrogation, one investigator confronted him directly, saying:

“Liar. A freezer in your home is locked for years and nobody in the house knows?”

When asked whether he feared that the IDF or Israeli security agencies would eventually discover that the body was being held at his property, Hilo replied:

“I was promised that nobody would know, and I was not afraid.”

According to his testimony, he left Gaza and relocated to Deir al-Balah five days after the October 7 massacre, while Oron Shaul’s body remained at the location where it had been hidden for years.

Hilo was later arrested during the war. Information he provided during questioning ultimately led to a significant intelligence breakthrough, paving the way for the operation that resulted in the recovery of Staff Sgt. Oron Shaul’s remains and his return to kever Yisroel.

{Matzav.com}