Hamas says it returned 2 more bodies of hostages; remains taken to forensic lab for ID

The Hamas terror group transferred to Israel two caskets Saturday night which it said contained the remains of two dead hostages held in Gaza, with the bodies handed to the Red Cross and then to the Israel Defense Forces and taken to a forensic institute for identification, according to Israeli authorities and the Palestinian terror group’s military wing.

If the bodies are confirmed to belong to hostages, it would mean that the number of bodies of dead captives still held in the Strip would go down from 18 to 16, after 28 were there at the start of the current ceasefire.

Hamas said that it had “retrieved” the bodies Saturday, and did not provide their identities.

The caskets were handed to Red Cross staff at a handover site in southern Gaza, and then handed to IDF troops who inspected them, draped them in Israeli flags and held a short ceremony led by a military rabbi.

The army then transported the bodies out of the Gaza Strip and handed them to the Israel Police, which escorted them to the Abu Kabir forensic institute in Tel Aviv for identification, a process which officials have said may take up to two days.

The current hostage deal required Hamas to release the remaining 20 living hostages, and the deceased hostages accessible to it, within 72 hours of Israel’s October 10 withdrawal to the so-called Yellow Line inside Gaza. Hamas released the living hostages in time and before Saturday night had released 10 of the last 28 dead hostages.

In exchange, Israel has released nearly 2,000 Palestinian security prisoners and detainees, including 250 terror convicts serving life terms, plus the bodies of 15 Palestinians for every one dead hostage returned.

Hamas has said it would require additional machinery to locate the remaining deceased hostages. Israel has accused Hamas of lying, saying it can return almost all of the bodies.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met on Thursday with close advisers to discuss potential steps that Israel could take to pressure Hamas to release the remaining bodies faster. Jerusalem has threatened to curb the entry of humanitarian aid to Gaza, and has kept the Rafah crossing between Egypt and Gaza closed.

Hamas said Saturday that the closure of the Rafah crossing was causing significant delays in the handover of hostages’ remains, alleging that the continued closure “blocks the entry of specialized equipment needed to search for those missing under the rubble and prevents forensic teams and tools required to identify bodies”, leading to “significant delays in the retrieval and transfer of remains.”

The war in Gaza started on October 7, 2023, when thousands of Hamas-led terrorists invaded southern Israel, killing some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and taking 251 hostages, amid acts of brutality and sexual assault.

Fighting stopped last weekend, after Israeli and Hamas negotiators signed the US-brokered deal, presented as the first phase of a 20-point White House peace plan, which would eventually see Hamas disarmed, Gaza demilitarized, and the installation of a transitional, “technocratic” government that could eventually hand power to the Palestinian Authority if the latter completes certain reforms.