Funeral services were held yesterday for three Israeli soldiers killed in the Yom Kippur War whose remains were returned to Israel a month ago under an agreement with Egyptian authorities. The men were identified as Staff Sgts. Hanoch Kaufman and Eliezer Benno and Corp. Jacob Moscovitz.
But officials of the army chaplaincy corps and experts of pathological institutes said that they are having difficulty identifying most of the other remains returned by the Egyptians. Of 39 bodies examined, only 12 have been positively identified so far. Two were Air Force pilots and 10 were soldiers who had manned the Litoff stronghold on the Barlev line and were apparently killed in the early stages of the Egyptian attack in October, 1973.
The pathologists are trying to match the remains with medical and dental records of the men who were originally listed as missing in action but the records are not available in all cases. If positive identification cannot be made, the chaplaincy corps will have no alternative but to inter the remains in a common grave with a marker inscribed with the names of all soldiers still missing.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
