Hamas hands over remains of another deceased Israeli hostage, IDF says

Hamas handed over the remains of another deceased hostage, the Israel Defense Forces said.

The IDF confirmed in a social media post on Saturday morning local time that the “coffin of the deceased hostage” was brought to Israel and was being taken to Israel’s National Institute of Forensic Medicine, where the body would be identified.

“The IDF urges the public to act sensitively and wait for official identification, which will first be communicated to the families of the deceased hostages,” the IDF wrote.

In an earlier post on social media on Friday night, the IDF said the Red Cross was “on its way to the meeting point in the southern Gaza Strip, where a coffin of a deceased hostage will be transferred into its custody.”

Hamas’s armed wing, the al-Qassam Brigades, had said earlier Friday that it would hand over the body.

The announcement comes after Hamas said on Wednesday that had handed over all the remains of Israeli hostages in Gaza that he had been able to recover, and great efforts and special equipment would be needed to find the remaining bodies.

He Peace plan for Gaza asked Hamas to hand over all remaining hostages (20 alive and 28 dead) for Monday, October 13. Since the plan went into effect last week, Hamas has been accused of delaying the handover of the remains of Israeli hostages believed to still be in Palestinian territory.

Hamas has handed over the remains of at least seven confirmed hostages since the peace deal went into effect, not including the body handed over on Friday, which has yet to be identified.

While Hamas returned the 20 live hostages By Monday’s deadline, only the remains of four deceased Israeli captives were handed over. Hamas transferred four more bodies on Tuesday, but The IDF said one of them was not a hostage.. If the remains handed over on Friday are confirmed to be an Israeli hostage, that means the remains of at least 20 hostages are still missing.

A senior U.S. adviser told reporters in a phone call Wednesday that “no one will be left behind,” noting that they believe there are still many bodies buried under mountains of rubble throughout Gaza. Senior US advisers said the level of destruction also makes mobility in the Palestinian territory difficult.

“It would have been almost impossible for Hamas to mobilize, even if they knew where the 28 bodies were, to mobilize and bring them home,” an adviser said Wednesday.

Surprisingly, the adviser said the United States is sharing Israeli intelligence with Hamas to help find hostage remains. The adviser also said Türkiye has offered to help search for and recover remains by sending teams of experts with experience in rescuing people from the country’s frequent earthquakes.

U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Mike Waltz said Thursday that American personnel would be part of the effort. recover the remains of the hostages who have not yet been handed over.

During the negotiations that led to the peace deal, Hamas representatives said they did not know the location of all the remains of the deceased hostages, according to Israeli media reports. President Trump also said in Egypt on Monday that not all of the bodies of the deceased hostages had been found, adding that unidentified parties were still “working” on how to locate an unspecified number of remains.

Senior U.S. advisers who spoke to reporters Wednesday urged patience and said they are not at a point where they feel the agreement has been violated, citing difficulties in recovering remains still in Gaza.

Both the Israel Hostage and Missing Families Forum, the group representing the hostage families, and Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz, have previously said that the entire peace deal should be shelved until Hamas returns all of the hostages’ remains.

In:

• Hamas
• Israel
• Gaza Strip