Among the seven hostages still held in Gaza, two are foreign nationals — Joshua Luito Mollel, an agricultural student from Tanzania, and Rintalak Suttisak, who came from Thailand to work in agriculture in Israel.
Joshua arrived in Israel only briefly before he was killed on Oct. 7 and taken into Gaza. He was one of several dozen Tanzanian students who arrived in Israel weeks before the massacre to train in agriculture and study at the Ibim Agro Campus. They were scheduled to begin classes right after the Jewish High Holidays. Until then, Joshua and his Tanzanian peers worked alongside Thai workers employed in kibbutzim and moshavim near the Gaza border. Joshua lived at Kibbutz Nahal Oz with another Tanzanian student, Owesios Helmangrid Kalahofs.
At 6:30 a.m. on Oct. 7, his roommate Owesios recalled waking up to rocket fire. Joshua was on duty at the dairy barn while Owesios was sleeping in their shared room. “I immediately called Joshua and he said he heard the siren and was in the shelter near the barn,” Owesios said. They talked on the phone for three hours until the phones stopped working. Owesios said a staffing company displayed photos of IDF, police and border‑police uniforms to help workers identify who to open doors to. He said the attackers wore civilian clothes so he avoided opening the door. He called their barn manager, Raymond, who lived in the same kibbutz, and learned there was no one there investigating Joshua’s welfare.
Two months later Joshua’s father was informed by Israeli Foreign Ministry officials that his son had been killed and his body was held by Hamas. In the absence of further information, the father refused to accept the news, and avoided telling Joshua’s mother. Meanwhile, Israeli media officially reported his death. A few days later, videos surfaced on Telegram showing his killing and his body in the bed of a pickup truck heading toward Gaza. The videos spread via several accounts, including Israeli media and the Foreign Ministry. “The extended Mollel family was struck by shock and deep grief when they learned of his killing via the videos,” the report said.
While Israeli media refrained from publishing the videos without the hostages’ families’ permission, videos featuring Nepali, Thai and Tanzanian nationals appeared without consent. The videos showing Joshua were only removed after his family requested it. About a month after the massacre, another Tanzanian national, Clemence Mtenga, was identified as killed while working at a dairy near Kibbutz Nir Oz.
Little is known about Rintalak Suttisak, a resident of Nong Khai province in Thailand, who was 43 when he was taken to Gaza. According to Thai media reports, he was divorced and had no children. In 2017, he came to Israel with several others from his village to work in agriculture and help his elderly parents. On the Saturday of Oct. 7, he was killed in an orchard near Kibbutz Be’eri and taken into Gaza. His aunt said he was “the backbone of the household” and, until his abduction, was in regular contact with his family. After news of his kidnapping, his mother, Orne, was hospitalized. In May 2024, the parents were notified that their son had been killed on Oct. 7. “I’ve come to terms with it to some degree, but my wife was in tears,” his father Thong‑ma told the online newspaper Manager Daily. The father appealed to Hamas to release the remaining Thai hostages: “They left Thailand seeking work abroad to escape poverty and hope for a better life,” he said. The parents also said they will wait to see if their son’s body returns from Gaza — if not, they will hold a funeral with only his photo.
First published: 05:15, 11.06.25