TEL AVIV, Israel — The Palestinian militant group Hamas returned the bodies of four Israelis taken hostage during the Oct. 7, 2023, attack after which Israel released hundreds of Palestinian prisoners and detainees under a six-week-old ceasefire set to expire this weekend.
Negotiations to hammer out details of the second phase of the ceasefire deal were supposed to begin earlier this month. President Trump's Middle East envoy, Steve Witkoff, is expected to return to the region this weekend. The first phase of the ceasefire expires Saturday.
Late Wednesday, Hamas returned the bodies of Itzhak Elgarat, 69; Tsachi Idan, 50; Ohad Yahalomi, 50; and 86-year-old Shlomo Mantzur. They were among the more than 250 people taken hostage in the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas-led attack on Israel that killed around 1,200 people and sparked the war in Gaza. More than 48,000 Palestinians have been killed in the conflict, according to Gaza health ministry assessments.
Wednesday's hostage return was unlike past hostage releases in that Hamas did not hold a ceremony to showcase the coffins. Instead, the militants handed the remains to the International Committee of the Red Cross, which transported them to Israel in ambulances.
Israeli experts to confirm identities
Israeli forensic experts examined the hostage remains to confirm their identities, according to the Hostages and Missing Families Forum.
Hamas returned the remains of an unidentified woman in a ceremony last week instead of the body of 32-year-old Shiri Bibas. Her remains were returned a day later. On Wednesday, Israelis lined the streets to watch the funeral procession for Bibas and her two young sons, Kfir and Ariel, who were nine-months-old and 4 years old respectively when they were taken hostage with their mother, and whose bodies were also returned and identified last week.
Hamas claims the family were killed in an Israeli air strike. Israeli forensic experts examined the bodies and the Israeli military said they were "brutally murdered" by their captors, but did not provide further details of their cause of death.
Bibas' husband, Yarden, who also had been held hostage in Gaza, was released alive earlier this month.
In exchange for the bodies of the hostages returned late Wednesday, Israel early Thursday released more than 600 Palestinian prisoners and detainees, most of them to the occupied Palestinian territories of Gaza and the West Bank. Some were sent to Egypt to be exiled under the deal. Videos showed detainees bowing down to the ground in prayer as soon as they got off a Red Cross bus in Gaza.
According to Palestinian officials, the returned Palestinians were to include 45 women and minors detained since Oct. 7, 2023. But the release of 24 of the women and minors was going to be delayed until forensic officials finished identifying the remains of the returned hostage bodies, an Israeli official told NPR.
Israel had delayed the release of more than 600 Palestinians after Hamas on Saturday paraded freed Israeli hostages in what Israeli officials described as a humiliating manner at ceremonies in Gaza ahead of their release.
Phase one of ceasefire expires on Sunday
Each side accused the other of violating the ceasefire, which came into effect Jan. 19. But an agreement for the exchange was reached Wednesday with Egypt negotiating. The sides agreed that there would be no Hamas ceremonies for the hostage bodies and in exchange Israel would release the Palestinian detainees and prisoners whose freedom had been held up since Saturday.
After the latest exchanges, 59 hostages remain held in Gaza, at least half of whom are believed dead, according to Israeli officials.
The ceasefire in Gaza ended 15 months of conflict and was brokered by the United States, Qatar and Egypt.
In comments to reporters in Washington, Trump said that whether or not the first phase of the deal is extended is up to Israel.
"That's a decision that has to be made by Israel, by Bibi, but Israel has to make that decision," said Trump. "Phase one is going to be ending."
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