Egyptian authorities along with Red Cross Join Search for Hostage Remains in Gaza
Units from Egypt and the ICRC have been granted permission to locate the remains of hostages who perished captured during the 7 October attacks, officials in Israel have verified.
The Israeli government stated that the teams have been allowed to operate beyond the so-called "demarcation line" in the region controlled by military personnel in Gaza.
The group has transferred fifteen out of 28 hostages who lost their lives under the first phase of a US-brokered truce agreement, which mandates it to transfer all hostage bodies. The organization said it is now coordinating with Egyptian authorities.
The former US president has cautions Hamas to begin returning the remains "promptly, or the other countries involved in this significant peace will intervene".
An official representative said the crew from Egypt has been permitted to collaborate with the ICRC to locate the bodies, and would use digging equipment and trucks for the search past the "yellow line".
The "demarcation line" indicates the boundary running along the northern, southern and east of the Gaza territory that Israel pulled back to, as part of the initial phase of the truce agreement.
Until now, Israeli authorities has not authorized the access of these crews.
Egypt, along with Qatar and Turkey, is a key signatory of the mediated by Trump peace initiative for Gaza, which was ratified in the coastal city of the resort town earlier this month.
The development will be greeted positively by relatives, eager to provide a proper burial.
The ICRC has already been heavily involved in the return of hostages.
Hamas does not transfer its captives - alive or deceased - straight to the Israel Defense Forces, but instead to the ICRC, which in turn escorts them through Gaza and hands them on to the Israeli military.
But the arrival of Egyptian excavation teams inside the Gaza territory is a recent development.
After more than 24 months of heavy shelling by Israeli forces, the United Nations estimates that as much as 84% of the area has been destroyed completely.
Hamas says it is making every effort to retrieve hostage bodies, but it encounters challenges locating them under debris of structures destroyed by the Israeli military in Gaza.
It is now working in coordination with the Egyptian authorities.
On Sunday, an Israeli government spokesperson said that the organization knew where the bodies were.
"If the group put in greater work, they would be able to retrieve the bodies of our captives," the spokesperson commented.
Trump shared on his social media account on Saturday that measures would be implemented if the bodies of the deceased hostages were not handed back quickly.
"A portion of the bodies are difficult to access, but the rest they can return at present and, for unknown reasons, they are not. Maybe it has to do with their disarming," he said.
Trump added: "Let's see what they accomplish over the coming two days. I am monitoring the situation very closely."
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On the weekend, the Israeli leader said the country would decide which foreign forces it would allow as part of a planned multinational contingent in the region to help secure the ceasefire under Trump's plan.
"We are in control of our security, and we have also made it clear regarding foreign troops that Israel will determine which units are unacceptable to us, and this is how we operate and will continue to operate," he said speaking at the start of a cabinet meeting.
On Friday, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said "numerous nations" had offered to be part of the contingent - but added Israeli authorities would have to be satisfied with those taking part.
This seemed like a allusion to Turkey, amid accounts Israeli officials had vetoed the country's involvement.
It remained unclear, however, how such a force could be stationed without an agreement with Hamas.
The Israeli military launched a armed operation in Gaza in following the 7 October 2023 attack, in which militants associated with the group killed about 1,200 people and captured two hundred fifty-one additional persons as captives.
No fewer than 68,519 have been killed in Israeli attacks in the region since then, according to the area's Hamas-run health ministry.