Holding flags, orange balloons and signs saying ''forgive us,'' tens of thousands of Israelis lined highways as the bodies of a mother and her two young sons, killed in captivity in the Gaza Strip, were taken for burial on Wednesday.

Crowds gathered in Israel for the funeral procession of the Bibas family, a mother and two young sons killed while being held hostage in Gaza. The story of their killing has enraged Israelis, and Israeli government representatives were not invited to the funeral.

Hamas agreed to release the last hostage bodies included in phase one of the Gaza ceasefire deal, in a breakthrough announced as Israelis mourned a family seen as a symbol of the trauma suffered by Israel in the attack on October 7,