From Le Figaro with AFP
Published 51 minutes ago, updated 40 minutes ago
Vultures are scavenging birds of prey with a very wide field of vision, allowing them to spot corpses from the sky, which make up the majority of their diet. BRUCE BENNETT/Getty Images via AFP
Several bodies were found. Additional help in the search while hundreds of “missing people” have not yet been found or identified.
Data provided by Vultures is helping the Israeli army locate bodies or mass graves near the sites of the Oct. 7 attack by Palestinian Hamas militants, AFP learned from a program manager.
The idea came from the EITAN unit, which is part of the Israeli army’s personnel department and is responsible for searching for missing soldiers. “When the war began, I was approached by reservists who served in this unit. I was asked if my birds could help with anything,” Ohad Hatzofe, director of the Endangered Birds Program at the Israel Nature and Parks Authority, told AFP.
The chances of finding “human remains” have become “minimal.”
Vultures are scavenging birds of prey with a very wide field of vision, allowing them to spot corpses from the sky, which make up the majority of their diet. There are many species in the world, but in Israel the griffon vulture is in danger of extinction.
The program tracks several hundred of these raptors equipped with GPS tags to understand their migration routes, their feeding behavior and study the threats to these protected species. On October 23, a rare large sea eagle, returning to Israeli skies after a summer sojourn in northern Russia, found itself near Beeri, one of the kibbutzim heavily attacked by Hamas commandos. And the next day, an advanced station near the village alerts the scientist. “I sent my details (to the army). They went to check and found four bodies,” explains Ohad Hatzofe, who cannot provide any further information about the location or identity of these bodies. Using data from a second bird, a Bonelli’s eagle, made it possible to find “other bodies within Israel,” Ohad Hatzofe explained.
Several hundred bodies of the “disappeared” have not yet been found or identified. “It helps to find our missing relatives,” comments the program manager. A month after the attack, the chances of finding “human remains” had “become minimal,” he added. According to the authorities, at least 1,400 people died on the Israeli side, most of the civilians died on the same day of the unprecedented attack by the Islamist movement Hamas, in which, according to Israel, around 240 hostages were also kidnapped. Police said Monday they had identified the bodies of 843 civilians and 351 soldiers. According to the Hamas government’s Health Ministry, the war in Gaza has claimed more than 10,500 lives, most of them civilians.
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