Mother of Omer Neutra, Israeli-American soldier from Plainview, describes excruciating pain as she awaits the return of her son's remains in Israel

The mother of the Plainview-raised Israeli American soldier killed by Hamas in the Oct. 7 attacks, told Newsday on Monday night that the excruciating wait for the return of her son's remains has been "surreal" and that her family desperately needs the "closure" that can only occur after giving him a proper burial.

In an interview from Israel, Orna Neutra described how the elation of watching the last 20 living hostages being released from Gaza last week was tinged with the grief of knowing that her son Omer was not among those coming home.

"It was nothing short of a miracle to see them back alive, standing on their own two feet," Neutra said. "But of course, we know that Omer is not going to come back to us in that same way. So it's very painful. And there's also a lot of anxiety among the families of the deceased hostages because there is no specific timeline. And because Hamas are controlling the narrative and controlling the releases."

'Sleepless nights'

The Oct. 9 ceasefire agreement stipulated that Hamas was supposed to return all the living and deceased hostages within 72 hours.

To date, Hamas has returned 13 of the 28 dead hostages — another body was on its way to Tel Aviv for identification Monday night — as part of the ceasefire agreement with Israel and negotiated by the Trump administration.

But Orna Neutra said she's received no news about when, or if, Omer's body will be returned.

"These are sleepless nights," said Neutra, who accuses Hamas of "playing games" and "breaching the deal" reached last week, citing Hamas' failure to return her son's body. "It's been one of the longest weeks imaginable."

Hamas says the war's devastation and Israeli military control of certain areas of Gaza have slowed the handover. Israel, however, contends that Hamas has access to more bodies than it has returned.

Hamas and other groups killed 1,200 people, mostly civilians, in the Oct. 7 attack on Israel, according to the Israeli government. The number of Palestinians killed by Israel's ongoing ground and air campaign in Gaza has exceeded 67,000, according to the Gaza Health Ministry, which does not distinguish between civilians and combatants.

For more than a year, the Neutras held onto hope that Omer would be found and released among the other Israeli captives.

But last December Israeli defense officials announced that Omer, who joined the Israeli army after graduating from The Schechter School of Long Island, had, in fact, been killed during the Oct. 7 attacks while serving as a tank platoon commander.

The Israel Defense Forces said at the time that Neutra’s body remained in Hamas custody, despite repeated pleas from the family and both the Trump and Biden administrations to release it.

'All so surreal'

In Jewish tradition, families quickly bury their dead and then begin the mourning process. 

"It's a very important part of our culture. One of the highest levels of grace is treatment of the deceased," Orna Neutra said in a phone interview with Rep. Tom Suozzi. "You don't just leave the body. You're supposed to bury it almost immediately. It's very ingrained in our in our culture and our religion. And we don't leave our people behind. You don't leave a soldier on the battlefield. You bring them back."

On Sunday, Suozzi (D-Glen Cove), whose district includes Plainview, wrote to President Donald Trump urging him to ensure that Neutra's remains, and of another American hostage with ties to New York, Itay Chen, are returned to their families.

"Amid their grief, these two families and their supporters are left questioning whether the continued captivity of their beloved children stems from genuine challenges in locating them or from the fact that they are American citizens," Suozzi wrote. " ... Securing the ceasefire and reuniting so many families is historic. Please help ensure these families can also find closure and properly lay their sons to rest."

To mark the second anniversary of the terror attacks, Orna, her husband, Ronen and their son Daniel met with Trump in the Oval Office this month, wearing a black shirt featuring a photo of Omer, who was 21 at the time of the attack. Above his photo read the words, "Our Hero."

Omer is a 2019 graduate of Schechter, a day school in Williston Park, where he was an honors student, the captain of his basketball, soccer and volleyball teams and highly active in several Jewish community organizations. He served as regional president of the Metropolitan New York Region of United Synagogue Youth.

Orna Neutra said she's hoping to meet with Vice President JD Vance and Trump special envoy Steve Witkoff as the administration officials visit Israel this week to discuss the next stage of the 20-point peace plan put forward by the White House.

"We still need to bring him back," Neutra said of her son. "This is all so surreal. So unreal. The families need that closure. They need that place to be able to mourn. The family needs that. We can't put this behind us. This whole experience has been just mortifying."