December 4, 2025 / 2:21 AM EST / CBS/AP
Israeli and Thai officials said Thursday that remains handed over to Israel by militants in Gaza were identified as the final Thai national taken during the Hamas-led Oct. 7, 2023, attack that ignited the war.
Thailand’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said Israeli authorities notified them that the remains returned Wednesday were those of Sudhisak Rinthalak, a Thai agricultural worker employed on a kibbutz. Israel’s National Institute of Forensic Medicine confirmed the identification, the office of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said.
Thai ministry spokesperson Nikorndej Balankura said Sudhisak’s family has been informed. He added that Sudhisak was killed on Oct. 7 and his body was taken into Gaza, and he thanked the Israeli government for its role in securing the return of all Thai hostages.
Under a U.S.-brokered ceasefire that began in early October, Israel has received 20 living hostages and the remains of 27 others. Those transfers are a central element of the ceasefire agreement, which has largely held even as both Israel and Hamas have accused each other of violations.
With the identification of Rinthalak’s remains, only one hostage’s body is still believed to be in Gaza: Ran Gvili. Gvili, who served in an elite Israeli police unit, helped people flee the Nova music festival during the Oct. 7 attack, was later killed in fighting elsewhere and his body taken into Gaza; the military confirmed his death four months after the assault. He is survived by his parents and a sister.
Netanyahu’s office said the government and the Directorate for the Hostages and the Missing remain committed to bringing home Master Sgt. Ran Gvili so he can receive a proper Jewish burial.
Since the ceasefire began, Israel has returned the bodies of hundreds of Palestinians to Gaza as part of exchanges for hostages and remains. Most of those Palestinian remains have yet to be formally identified.