Dikla and Tomer Arava 'likely' killed by IDF fire on Oct 7, official probe finds

Two of the residents of Kibbutz Nahal Oz, Dikla Arava, 51, and her son Tomer Arava Eliaz, 17, were most likely killed by Israeli fire during the Hamas attack on October 7, an official Israel Defense Forces investigation found. 

The probe's findings, made public Friday, were presented to the victim's families a day earlier. 

"It should be emphasized that in both cases, it is not possible to determine with absolute certainty what caused the deaths of Tomer Eliaz-Arava and Dikla Arava," the report reads. 

The sequence of events emerging from the report is as follows: on the morning of October 7, armed Palestinian jihadists broke into the Arava-Elyakim family home in Nir Oz, and riddled with bullets the door to their bomb-safe room, wounding Dikla's partner Noam Elyakim, 46, who would later die.

The terrorists then stole Dikla's phone, launching a Facebook livestream which showed her son Tomer walking at gunpoint around nearby houses in the kibbutz and calling the neighbors to come out of their homes.

The investigation established that at some point Tomer managed to flee from the terrorists. It was then that IDF troops battling numerous terrorists in Nahal Oz spotted "a suspicious figure," now believed to have been Tomer, and opened fire.

“The findings of the investigation suggest that the figure was most likely the late Tomer Arava Eliaz, who was killed by fire from our forces in this incident due to a misidentification,” the IDF says, adding he “acted bravely until the moment he was shot.”

Per the report, it was roughly at the same time that "the terrorists abducted Noam Elyakim, his two daughters, Ela and Dafna, and his partner, Dikla Arava, into their vehicle. The inquiry revealed that during the drive toward Gaza, the vehicle was fired upon from the rear. As a result, Dikla Arava was killed."  

"After the shooting, the terrorists abandoned the vehicle within the kibbutz, leaving behind Dikla Arava’s body. The inquiry suggests a reasonable possibility that Dikla Arava was killed by IDF fire after being in a vehicle identified by the forces as belonging to fleeing terrorists."

Sisters Ela and Dafna Elyakim were released from captivity in the November 2023 hostage deal.