Israel And Hamas Are Now Exchanging The Bodies Of The Dead Israeli And Palestinian Hostages
On Monday, Oct 13, Hamas handed over all 20 living Israeli captives, and in exchange, Israel released more than 1,700 Palestinians it detained without charges.
Israel and Hamas have started exchanging the bodies of dead hostages, but Israel is now threatening the ceasefire after Hamas said it is unable to reach the rest of the bodies due to the destruction in Gaza.
On Monday, Oct 13, Hamas handed over all 20 living Israeli captives, and in exchange, Israel released more than 1,700 Palestinians it detained without charges after Oct. 7, 2023, as well as 250 Palestinians who were convicted and sentenced to life in prison.
According to the ceasefire deal, Hamas is also expected to return the bodies of the remaining 28 hostages.
For each dead Israeli hostage, Israel will release the bodies of 15 dead Palestinians.
Later, on Monday evening, Hamas released four bodies of Israeli hostages, who were taken for identification when returned to Israel.
Over the following days, Hamas continued to return bodies, releasing in total eight bodies.
In return, Israel has returned 90 Palestinian bodies.
Gaza’s health ministry forensics team said most of the Palestinian bodies were returned bearing signs of physical abuse or torture.
Some of the Palestinian bodies were blindfolded and handcuffed, indicating “field executions” may have taken place, according to Al Jazeera.
Hamas then said it returned all the Israeli hostage bodies it could access, adding that significant efforts and special equipment are needed to locate and recover the remaining 19 dead hostages.
In response, Israel said on Wednesday, Oct. 15, it would cut in half the number of humanitarian aid trucks allowed into Gaza, reducing the daily aid deliveries from 600 trucks to 300 trucks, and refused to open the Rafah crossing as punishment, claiming Hamas had violated the ceasefire deal by failing to turn over the bodies of hostages.
Israeli defense minister Israel Katz also threatened on Wednesday to resume fighting if Hamas “refuses to comply with the agreement.”
This comes despite the ceasefire deal clearly acknowledging that some of the Israeli hostages’ bodies would be difficult to recover due to Israel’s genocide, which reduced most of Gaza to rubble and killed more than 67,967 Palestinians.
Cherry Mohamed
Flavie Chen
Kassy Cho
