🔗 Share this article

Units from Egypt and the ICRC have been authorized to search for the remains of hostages who perished taken during the 7 October attacks, officials in Israel have verified.

The authorities in Israel announced that the teams have been allowed to operate beyond the so-called "yellow line" in the area under the control of Israeli forces in Gaza.

The group has transferred 15 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 stated it is now working together with Egyptian authorities.

Donald Trump has warned the organization to begin returning the bodies "quickly, or the additional nations involved in this significant peace will take action".

An official representative said the crew from Egypt has been permitted to work with the ICRC to find the remains, and would use excavator machines and trucks for the search past the "yellow line".

The "demarcation line" marks the boundary running along the north, southern and east of Gaza that Israel pulled back to, as part of the initial phase of the truce agreement.

Previously, Israel has not approved the access of these crews.

The Egyptian government, along with Qatari officials and Turkey, is a key signatory of the Trump-brokered Gaza peace plan, which was ratified in the Egyptian resort of Sharm el-Sheikh in recent weeks.

The development will be welcomed by relatives, desperate to provide a dignified funeral.

The International Committee of the Red Cross has already been heavily involved in the return of captives.

Hamas does not hand over its detainees - alive or deceased - straight to the IDF, 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 Strip is a recent development.

After more than two years of heavy shelling by Israel, the UN estimates that as much as eighty-four percent of the territory has been destroyed completely.

The group says it is doing its best to recover remains of captives, but it encounters challenges finding them under debris of structures bombed out by the IDF in the region.

It is now coordinating with the officials in Egypt.

On the weekend, an official representative said that the organization was aware of where the bodies were.

"If the group put in greater work, they would be able to recover the bodies of our hostages," the spokesperson said.

Trump shared on his social media account on Saturday that measures would be implemented if the bodies of the hostages who died were not handed back promptly.

"A portion of the remains are hard to reach, but the rest they can return now and, for unknown reasons, they are not. Perhaps it has do with their disarming," he said.

Trump added: "We will observe what they do over the coming two days. I am watching this with great attention."

• Palestinian children losing their lives as they wait for Israeli authorities to permit evacuations
• Rubio says lots of nations willing to join the region's peacekeeping unit
• Recent photographs reveal demarcation zone further into the territory than expected

On the weekend, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the country would decide which foreign forces it would allow as part of a planned international force in Gaza to help secure the ceasefire under Trump's plan.

"We are in control of our security, and we have also made it clear regarding international forces that we will determine which units are not acceptable to us, and this is how we operate and will proceed," he said speaking at the start of a cabinet meeting.

On the end of the week, the American diplomat indicated "numerous nations" had offered to be involved in the force - but added Israeli authorities would have to be satisfied with those taking part.

This seemed like a reference to the Turkish government, amid reports Israeli officials had rejected the nation's involvement.

It was still uncertain, however, how such a force could be stationed without an agreement with Hamas.

Israel launched a armed operation in the territory in response to the 7 October 2023 attack, in which militants associated with the group killed about 1,200 individuals and took 251 additional persons as captives.

No fewer than sixty-eight thousand five hundred nineteen have been lost their lives in military actions in Gaza from that time, according to the area's Hamas-run health ministry.