Our personal journey may have reached its conclusion, but not the hostage families’ collective journey - we will NOT rest, will NOT stop, until the last hostage returns home," said Ruby Chen. Slain hostage Itay Chen’s family gave their first statement to the media on Wednesday in Tel Aviv after forensic scientists identified his remains earlier that morning.

The father of Staff Sgt. Itay Chen, whose body was returned from Gaza by Hamas on Tuesday, says the family can now start to move forward with a sense of closure, but that the fight goes on to secure the release of the remaining hostages.

The set of remains handed over to Israel on Tuesday were those of Itay Chen, the final remaining American Israeli hostage, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said.

Our personal journey may have reached its conclusion, but not the hostage families’ collective journey - we will NOT rest, will NOT stop, until the last hostage returns home”

A member of the IDF’s Battalion 77, Sa'ar Golan Division, Chen fell in battle and was abducted into Gaza on the morning of October 7th.