🔗 Share this article

Units from Egyptian authorities and the International Committee of the Red Cross have been authorized to search for the remains of deceased hostages captured during the 7 October attacks, officials in Israel have confirmed.

The Israeli government stated that the crews have been allowed to operate beyond the referred to as "demarcation line" in the area controlled by military personnel in the Gaza territory.

Hamas has transferred 15 out of 28 deceased Israeli hostages under the initial stage of a US-brokered ceasefire deal, which mandates it to hand over all remains of captives. The group stated it is now working together with Egyptian authorities.

The former US president has warned Hamas to start return the bodies "quickly, or the other countries involved in this significant peace will intervene".

An official representative indicated the Egyptian team has been permitted to collaborate with the ICRC to find the remains, and would use excavator machines and vehicles for the operation past the "demarcation line".

The "yellow line" marks the boundary running along the north, southern and eastern of the Gaza territory that Israeli forces pulled back to, as part of the initial phase of the truce agreement.

Previously, Israel has not authorized the access of such teams.

The Egyptian government, along with Qatar and Turkey, is a key signatory of the Trump-brokered peace initiative for Gaza, which was ratified in the Egyptian resort of Sharm el-Sheikh earlier this month.

The development will be welcomed by relatives, eager to provide a proper burial.

The ICRC has already been deeply engaged in the return of hostages.

The organization does not hand over its captives - alive or deceased - directly to the IDF, but rather to the Red Cross, which in turn accompanies them through Gaza and transfers them to the IDF.

But the arrival of Egyptian excavation teams inside the Gaza Strip is new.

After more than 24 months of intense bombardment by Israeli forces, the UN calculates that as much as eighty-four percent of the territory has been reduced to rubble.

The group claims it is doing its best to retrieve hostage bodies, but it faces difficulty finding them under rubble of buildings bombed out by the IDF in the region.

It is now working in coordination with the officials in Egypt.

On Sunday, an official representative said that Hamas was aware of where the bodies were.

"If the group made more of an effort, they would be able to retrieve the remains of our captives," the spokesperson commented.

The former president posted on his social media account on the weekend that action would be taken if the bodies of the deceased hostages were not returned quickly.

"Some of the bodies are hard to reach, but others they can return now and, for some reason, they are not. Perhaps it has do with their disarming," he remarked.

He added: "Let's see what they do over the next 48 hours. I am monitoring the situation with great attention."

• Gaza minors dying as they await Israel to permit relocations
• Rubio says lots of nations prepared to participate in the region's peacekeeping unit
• Recent photographs show demarcation zone deeper into the territory than anticipated

On Sunday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced Israel would decide which international troops it would permit as part of a proposed multinational contingent in the region to help secure the truce under the former president's initiative.

"We are in control of our safety, and we have also made it clear regarding foreign troops that we will determine which forces are not acceptable to us, and this is how we operate and will continue to operate," he said talking at the start of a government session.

On the end of the week, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio indicated "numerous nations" had offered to be part of the contingent - but noted Israel would have to be satisfied with those taking part.

This appeared to be a reference to the Turkish government, amid accounts Israel had vetoed the nation's participation.

It remained unclear, however, how such a force could be deployed without an agreement with the organization.

The Israeli military initiated a armed operation in Gaza in response to the 7 October 2023 attack, in which Hamas-led gunmen killed about 1,200 people and took 251 additional persons as captives.

No fewer than 68,519 have been lost their lives in military actions in Gaza since then, according to the territory's health authorities under the group's control.