Bereaved families from Kibbutz Kfar Aza petitioned the High Court of Justice on Tuesday, asking it to stop the evacuation, demolition, or relocation of the kibbutz’s “Young Generation” neighborhood, one of the most recognizable and devastated sites of the October 7 massacre.
The petition was filed by parents of five young residents of the neighborhood - Sivan Elkabetz, Naor Hassidim, Aviad Edri, Nirel Zini, and Yotam Haim - who were murdered or abducted by Hamas terrorists during the October 7, 2023 attack.
The families asked the court to issue an interim injunction barring Kibbutz Kfar Aza from carrying out any demolition or relocation work until the state completes a formal administrative process on the fate of the site. They also asked the court to order the state to explain why the neighborhood should not be preserved in its original location as a national heritage or memorial site.
“Their loved ones’ homes are the scenes of the murder, fighting and abduction themselves,” the petition reads, calling the buildings “the last physical remains of the horror that took place there.”
Kfar Aza was among the communities hit hardest on October 7. Some 64 kibbutz members were killed and 19 were abducted to Gaza, according to the IDF investigation into the attack presented to the community in February 2025.
The Young Generation neighborhood
The “Young Generation” neighborhood, which housed many of the kibbutz’s young adults, soldiers, students, and young couples, became one of the massacre’s most searing symbols. According to the petition, 11 of the neighborhood’s 37 residents were murdered, and seven were abducted to Gaza. The petition argues that because the neighborhood has largely remained frozen since the massacre, with burned homes, bullet marks, broken doors, and other evidence still visible, it has become an irreplaceable “house of testimony” to the events of October 7.
The petition follows a March 4 vote by Kibbutz Kfar Aza members, in which the community chose a plan to partially relocate elements of the neighborhood to an area near the kibbutz, where an external memorial and heritage center would be built. According to the petition, 205 of 297 voters supported the relocation plan, while two other options that would have preserved all or part of the neighborhood in its current location received 44 and 48 votes, respectively.
The petitioners argued that the vote cannot be the final word on a matter they say carries national, historical, educational, and international significance.
The decision, they argued, was made by a private communal body without a proper state-led process, without fully hearing the bereaved families and survivors, and before the state had completed a professional review of preservation options. The petition also argued that the vote was held while many community members were still displaced from their homes and living under the continuing trauma of war.
“This is not a regular real estate or planning dispute,” the petition said. “It concerns the right of bereaved families, massacre survivors, the Israeli public and future generations to remember, learn and commemorate one of the most difficult atrocities in Jewish history since the Holocaust.”
The petition names the heritage minister, finance minister, New Hope-United Right MK Ze'ev Elkin, who serves as a minister within the Finance Ministry and is responsible for the Tekuma Directorate, the defense minister and interior minister, and Kibbutz Kfar Aza itself as respondents.
The families argue that the state has several legal tools available to preserve the site, including declaring the area a national heritage site or official memorial site, or using land powers where necessary for a public memorial purpose.
They also relied on previous statements from Heritage Ministry officials supporting preservation in place. In March, Heritage Minister Amichai Eliyahu had written to bereaved families that he intended to act to preserve the historical evidence in the neighborhood and support keeping the homes as national heritage sites for future generations.
However, the public record on the government’s position has since become more complicated. In late April, Eliyahu had said he would respect the decision of the Kfar Aza community regarding the memorial plan, after a professional tour at the kibbutz with local and regional officials.
The petitioners nevertheless argued that once state officials recognized the site’s national value, the government could not stand aside while irreversible facts were created on the ground.
The legal fight comes as Kfar Aza continues to balance two painful imperatives: the need to rebuild a shattered community and the demand by some bereaved families and survivors to preserve the exact places where the massacre unfolded.
Demolition work in other parts of Kfar Aza began in December 2024, with 97 buildings designated for demolition, though at the time no decision had yet been made about 48 buildings in the neighborhood.
Attorney Dr. Dan Hay, who filed the petition with attorneys Tomer Arad and Sahar Saban, said the site should serve as an eternal memorial to the massacre.
“This is a heritage site that should serve as an everlasting monument to the most terrible massacre in Israel’s history,” Hay said. “We all bear the responsibility to preserve it for future generations and in the face of attempts by our enemies to deny it.”
Anat Elkabetz, mother of Sivan Elkabetz, called the neighborhood “the black box of the Jewish people.”
“The story of the Young Generation neighborhood is no longer only our story,” she said. “It is the black box of the Jewish people and the bleeding wound of our generation. Demolishing the houses of testimony is tearing out pages of history that belong to all of our children and grandchildren.”