Parents of Murdered Israeli Hostage Welcome Son Born From Eggs Frozen 25 Years Ago

A family shattered by Hamas is starting over, literally.

Nira and Yigal Sarusi, both around 60 and living in Ra'anana, welcomed a son named Lavi on Yom Kippur this year. The baby was conceived using eggs the couple froze roughly 25 years ago during an unrelated medical procedure, carried by a surrogate after the Sarusis rediscovered the eggs following the murder of their eldest son, Almog.

Almog Sarusi was 26 when Hamas terrorists abducted him from the Nova music festival on October 7, 2023. According to the New York Post, he had been shot but stayed behind to help his wounded girlfriend, Shahar, who was later killed. He planned to propose to her the following year.

Almog survived 331 days in Hamas captivity before he was executed in a tunnel in Rafah in late August 2024, alongside five other hostages: Hersh Goldberg-Polin, Eden Yerushalmi, Ori Danino, Carmel Gat and Alex Lobanov, according to Ynet News. The six became known in Israel as "The Beautiful Six." He was 27.

After his death, the Sarusis remembered the eggs they had frozen decades earlier. Israel Hayom reported the eggs had been "largely forgotten" as the couple's children grew up, and were only rediscovered after Almog's death, prompting a family conversation about pursuing surrogacy. Yigal Sarusi told the New York Post the decision was made with the blessing of their three surviving children.

The path wasn't smooth. Because the eggs were frozen using older technology, a surrogate the family found faced what Israel Hayom described as an "exceptional medical challenge" in fertilizing them. Several attempts failed before a final try succeeded. Yigal told the New York Post the pregnancy was kept private throughout: "We didn't talk about it because we didn't know if it would succeed."

Lavi, which means "lion" in Hebrew, was born on Yom Kippur. His brit milah, the Jewish circumcision ceremony, was held this week at the Noaleh hall in Ra'anana. Ra'anana Mayor Chaim Broyde, who attended, wrote that he had "participated in one of the most emotional circumcisions imaginable," calling it "a blood connection between two brothers who will never meet," according to Israel Hayom.

Almog's sister, Amit Sarusi, announced the birth on Instagram, writing that "Almog moved things around up there to make this happen," per Ynet News. She wrote that the pain of her brother's absence "lives inside us every moment" but that "life simply goes on alongside it," and vowed the family would raise Lavi knowing his late brother was, in her words, a hero without equal.

Yigal Sarusi told the New York Post he wants Lavi to grow up embodying Almog's values. He described his murdered son as "brave, strong, optimistic," someone who tutored children and shopped for the needy on holidays, and who was rarely seen without his guitar and white Jeep. "We teach his values," Yigal said. "We are all Almog now."

The family runs a nonprofit called "Ein Tov Mihiyot Tov" ("There's Nothing Better Than Being Good") in Almog's memory. JFeed reported that Yigal has said the family hopes to eventually open a home for at-risk children and help establish a new community in the Negev, continuing what he described as his son's path.

There is no dispute among the outlets covering this story about the central facts: the timeline of Almog's kidnapping and murder, the age of the frozen eggs, or the surrogacy process. The coverage differs mainly in tone. The New York Post leans into the family's own religious framing of the birth as "divine intervention," quoting Yigal directly on that point, while Ynet News and Israel Hayom lead with the logistics of the medical procedure and the emotional ceremony itself. None of the five outlets reporting on the birth identify the surrogate by name or detail the fertility clinic involved, and neither is the subject of any ongoing dispute in the source material.

What remains unanswered publicly is what, if anything, the family plans to say about the specific fertility technology or clinic that made a 25-year-old frozen egg viable. This detail could matter to other families facing similarly long-dormant frozen samples.