TEL AVIV—Israel conducted dozens of airstrikes across Gaza on Sunday and halted humanitarian aid into the enclave after it accused Hamas of killing troops inside Israeli-controlled areas in what is shaping up to be the biggest test yet of
the fragile cease-fire.
The Israeli military said two soldiers were killed in southern Gaza, where militants targeted troops inside Israeli-controlled areas with an antitank missile and gunfire. Another soldier was severely injured, the military said.
Hamas made two other attempts to attack Israeli soldiers on Sunday, the military said.
Israel decided to halt humanitarian aid, which Israeli officials confirmed, following calls from Israeli politicians across the political spectrum for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to respond forcefully to the attack against troops.
TEL AVIV—When President Trumppresented his 20-point plan to bring the Gaza war to an end last month from a White House lectern, he interrupted himself twice to talk directly to someone sitting in the front row: “Right, Ron?” he said.
That man was Ron Dermer, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s closest confidant and the manager of Israel’s relationship with America—and by extension, Trump. Most Americans don’t know his name and he rarely speaks publicly in Israel. But he is one of the most influential American-born Israeli politicians in the nation’s history and has been key to maintaining U.S. support for the war and cutting a deal to end it largely on Israel’s terms.
The terrorist group Hamas may be planning an attack on “Palestinian civilians” in the Gaza Strip, the U.S. State Department announced Saturday.
In a statement, the State Department said that it “informed the guarantor nations of the Gaza peace agreement of credible reports indicating an imminent ceasefire violation by Hamas against the people of Gaza.”
It did not provide any details on the potential attack, the target or location, or when it might occur, only saying that it “would constitute a direct and grave violation of the ceasefire agreement and undermine the significant progress achieved through mediation efforts.”
“Should Hamas proceed with this attack, measures will be taken to protect the people of Gaza and preserve the integrity of the ceasefire,” the State Department added. It did not disclose what those measures might entail.
This also comes after CBS News obtained a video Wednesday which shows armed Hamas fighters standing over Palestinians they have accused of being gang members collaborating with Israel. Moments later in the video, they execute them.
Israeli hostage negotiator Gershon Baskin told CBS News that the video depicts a long pattern of punishment that Hamas uses against suspected collaborators with Israel.
“Hamas is killing them because they can,” Baskin told CBS News this week. “Hamas is a criminal organization that has ruled the Palestinian people in Gaza for almost 20 years. This is not a democratic, liberal regime.”
Baskin also explained that Palestinian militia groups that are opposed to Hamas had been armed by Israel during the war in an effort to weaken Hamas’ power.
“Israel has empowered, with weapons and money, gangs of Palestinians who were involved in mostly illegal activities in the past — selling drugs, illegal smuggling — and they’ve empowered them as an alternative to Hamas,” Baskin said. “This is not sustainable.”
President Trump on Tuesday appeared to acknowledge that Hamas was engaged in violence against Palestinian militia groups.
“They did take out a couple of gangs that were very bad gangs, very, very bad,” Mr. Trump said of Hamas while speaking with reporters. “And that didn’t bother me much, to be honest with you.”
Palestinians gather at a market in Deir el-Balah in the central Gaza Strip, more than a week after a ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hamas took hold, on Oct. 18, 2025.
BASHAR TALEB/AFP via Getty Images
Hamas’ role in Gaza’s future remains murky. Israel has demanded that Hamas disarm, and the ceasefire deal calls for it to relinquish its governance of the Palestinian territory to a “technocratic, apolitical Palestinian committee, responsible for delivering the day-to-day running of public services and municipalities for the people in Gaza.”
On Monday, Mr. Trump and world leaders signed onto the U.S.-brokered agreement designed to bring a halt to the two-year Israel-Hamas war.
As part of the deal, Hamas released 20 living hostages, while Israel released about 2,000 Palestinian prisoners and detainees. Israel also pulled its troops back to a preapproved line in Gaza.
The deal also calls for Hamas to release the remains of 28 deceased hostages, but so far it has only released the remains of 10 of those. Another two bodies were released by Hamas Saturday, but they are pending identification.
According to the Associated Press, Israel has so far returned to Gaza the bodies of 135 Palestinians as part of the agreement.
“I rode away on a camel with my grandmother, along a sandy road, and I started to cry.” Ayish Younis is describing the worst moment of his life – he still regards it as such, even though it was 77 years ago, and he’s lived through many horrors since.
It was 1948, the first Arab-Israeli war was raging, and Ayish was 12. He and his whole extended family were fleeing their homes in the village of Barbara – famed for its grapes, wheat, corn and barley – in what had been British-ruled Palestine.
“We were scared for our lives,” Ayish says. “On our own, we had no means to fight the Jews, so we all started to leave.”
The camel took Ayish and his grandmother seven miles south from Barbara, to an area held by Egypt that would become known as the Gaza Strip. It was just 25 miles long and a few miles wide, and had just become occupied by Egyptian forces.
In all an estimated 700,000 Palestinians lost their homes and became refugees as a result of the war of 1948-49; around 200,000 are believed to have crowded into that tiny coastal corridor.
“We had bits of wood which we propped against the walls of a building to make a shelter,” Ayish says.
Later, they moved into one of the huge tented camps established by the United Nations.
Today, aged 89, Ayish is again living in a tent in Al-Mawasi near Khan Younis.
In May last year, seven months into the two-year war between Israel and Hamas, Ayish was forced to leave his home in the southern Gaza city of Rafah after an evacuation order from the Israeli military.
The four-storey house, divided into several apartments, that he had shared with his children and their families, was destroyed by what he believes may have been Israeli tank-fire.
Now, home is a small white canvas tent just a few metres across.
[BBC]
Ayish’s family home was destroyed during the conflict (pictured above). He is once is again living in a tent (pictured) – now in the Al-Mawasi near Khan Yunis [BBC]
Other members of the family are in neighbouring tents. They have all had to cook on an open fire. With no access to running water they wash using canned water, which is scarce and as a result expensive.
“We returned to what we started with, we returned back to tents, and we still don’t know how long we will be here,” he says, sitting in a plastic chair on the bare sand outside his tent, with clothes drying on a washing line nearby.
A walking frame is propped beside him, as he moves with difficulty. But he still speaks in the crystal-clear, melodious Arabic of one who studied literature, and recited the Quran daily as the imam of a local mosque.
“After we left Barbara and lived in a tent, we eventually succeeded in building a house. But now, the situation is more than a catastrophe. I don’t know what the future holds, and whether we will ever be able to rebuild our house again.”
“And in the end I just want to go back to Barbara, with my whole extended family, and again taste the fruit that I remember from there.”
Ayish’s greatest desire is to return to the village, now in Israel, which he last saw when he was 12 – even though it no longer exists [BBC]
On 9 October, Israel and Hamas agreed to the first phase of a ceasefire and hostage release deal. The remaining living 20 Hamas-held hostages were returned to Israel and Israel released nearly 2,000 Palestinian detainees and prisoners.
Yet despite widespread rejoicing over the ceasefire, Ayish is not optimistic about the long-term prospects for Gaza.
“I hope the peace will spread and it will be calm,” he says. “But I believe the Israelis will do whatever they like.”
Under the agreement for the first stage of the ceasefire, Israel will retain control of more than half the Gaza Strip, including Rafah.
One question Ayish, his family and all Gazans are pondering is whether their homeland will ever be successfully rebuilt.
My 18 children and 79 grandchildren
Back in 1948, the Egyptian army had been one of five Arab armies that had invaded the British-controlled territory of Mandate Palestine the day after the establishment of a Jewish state, Israel. But they soon withdrew, defeated, from Barbara, prompting Ayish’s decision to flee.
Ayish became a teacher when he was 19, and gained a literature degree in Cairo under a scholarship programme.
The best moment of his life, he says, was when he married his wife Khadija. Together they had 18 children. That, according to a newspaper article that once featured him, is a record – the largest number of children from the same mother and father of any Palestinian family.
Today, he has 79 grandchildren, two of them born in the last few months.
The family would move from their first tent to a simple three-room cement house with an asbestos roof in the refugee camp, which they later extended to nine rooms – thanks partly to wages earned in Israel.
When the border between Israel and Gaza opened, and Ayish’s eldest son Ahmed was one of many Palestinians who took advantage of that, working in an Israeli restaurant during his holidays, while studying medicine in Egypt.
“During that time, in Israel, people were paid very well. And this is the period of time where the Palestinians made most of their money,” he says.
All but one of Ayish’s children gained university degrees. They became engineers, nurses, teachers. Several moved abroad. Five are in Gulf countries and Ahmed, a specialist in spinal cord injuries, now lives in London. Many other Gazan families are similarly scattered.
Ayish’s son Ahmed Younis is a specialist in spinal cord injuries and now lives in London [BBC]
The Younis family, like many Gazans, wanted nothing to do with politics. Ayish became an imam at a Rafah mosque – and a local headman (or mukhtar) responsible for settling disputes, just as his uncle had been years earlier in the village of Barbara.
He was not appointed by the government – but he says that both Hamas and the Fatah political movement, the dominant party in the Palestinian authority, respected him.
That didn’t save the family from tragedy, though, during the street battles of 2007, when Fatah and Hamas fought for control of the Strip. Ayish’s daughter Fadwa was killed in cross-fire as she sat in a car.
The rest of the family survived through wars between Hamas and Israel in 2008, 2012, 2014 – as well as the devastating war triggered by the deadly Hamas attack on Israel on 7 October 2023.
Then came that evacuation order by the Israeli military who said they were carrying out operations against Hamas in the area, forcing them to leave their Rafah home and over a year spent living in makeshift tents.
Ayish’s life has come full circle since 1948. But his greatest desire is to go even further back in time, to return to the village, now in Israel, which he last saw when he was 12 – even though it no longer exists.
Apart from clothes, cooking pots and a few other essentials, the only possessions he has with him in his tent are the precious title deeds to his ancestral land in Barbara.
‘I don’t believe Gaza has any future’
Thoughts are now turning to the reconstruction of Gaza.
But Ayish believes the extent of the destruction – of infrastructure, schools and health services – is so great that it cannot be fully repaired, even with the help of the international community.
“I don’t believe Gaza has any future,” he says.
He believes that his grandchildren could play a role in the reconstruction of Gaza if the ceasefire is fully implemented, but he does not believe they will be able to find jobs in the territory as good as those they have or could get abroad.
His son Haritha, a graduate in Arabic language who has four daughters and a son, is also living in a tent. “An entire generation has been destroyed by this war.
“We are unable to comprehend it,” he says.
“We used to hear from our fathers and grandfathers about the 1948 war and how difficult the displacement was, but there is no comparison between 1948 and what happened in this war.
“We hope that our children will have a role in rebuilding, but as Palestinians, do we have the capacity on our own to rebuild the schools? Will donor countries play a role in that?”
“My daughter has gone through two years of war without schooling, and for two years before that schools were closed because of Covid,” he continues. “I used to work in a clothing store, but it was destroyed.
“We don’t know how things will unfold or how we will have a source of income. There are so many questions we have no answers for. We simply don’t know what the future holds.”
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Another of Ayish’s sons, Nizar, a trained nurse, who lives in a tent nearby, agrees. He believes Gaza’s problems are so great that the youngest generation of the family will not be able to play much role, despite their high level of education.
“The situation is unbearable,” he says. “We hope that life will return to how it was before the war. But the destruction is massive – total destruction of buildings and infrastructure, psychological devastation within the community, and the destruction of universities.”
The 1948 Palestinian exodus: ‘We used to hear from our fathers and grandfathers about the 1948 war and how difficult the displacement was, but there is no comparison between [that] and this war’ [Getty Images]
Ayish’s eldest son Ahmed, in London, meanwhile reflects on how it took the family more than 30 years to build their former home into what it eventually became – as money was saved over the years it was expanded, he explains.
“Do I have another 30 years to work and try to help and support my family? This is really the situation all the time – every 10 to 15 years, people lose everything and they come back to square one.”
And yet he still dreams of living in Rafah again when he retires. “My brothers in the Gulf bought land in Rafah to come back and settle as well. My son, and my nephews and nieces – they want to go back.”
With a pause, he adds: “By nature, I’m very optimistic, because I know how determined our Gaza people are. Trust me, they will go back and start to rebuild their lives again.
“The hope is always in the new generation to rebuild.”
Top picture credit: AFP via Getty Images
[BBC]
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Israel says the remains of another hostage that Hamas handed over the day before have been identified as Eliyahu Margalit, as the Palestinian militant group looks for more bodies under the rubble in the Gaza Strip and urges more aid to be allowed into the embattled enclave.Israel’s Prime Minister’s Office said Saturday Margalit’s body was identified after testing by the National Center for Forensic Medicine and his family has been notified. The 76-year-old was abducted on Oct. 7, 2023, when Hamas attacked Israel, from the horse stables where he worked in Kibbutz Nir Oz.Margalit is the 10th returned hostage body since the ceasefire went into effect over a week ago. Hamas handed over an 11th body this week, but it wasn’t that of a hostage. The effort to find the remains followed a warning from U.S. President Donald Trump that he would green-light Israel to resume the war if Hamas doesn’t live up to its end of the deal and return all hostages’ bodies, totaling 28.In a statement Saturday, the hostage forum, which supports the families of those abducted, said Margalit’s return brings a measure of solace to his family, but that they won’t rest until the remaining 18 hostages are returned. The forum says it will continue holding weekly rallies until all remains are brought back.The handover of hostages’ remains, called for under the ceasefire agreement, has been among the key sticking points — along with aid deliveries, the opening of border crossings into Gaza and hopes for reconstruction — in a process backed by much of the international community to help end two years of devastating war in Gaza.Hamas has said it is committed to the terms of the ceasefire deal, including the handover of bodies. However, the retrieval of bodies is hampered by the scope of the devastation and the presence of dangerous, unexploded ordnance. The group has also told mediators that some bodies are in areas controlled by Israeli troops.Margalit’s body was found after two bulldozers plowed up pits in the earth in the city of Khan Younis.Nine Palestinians killed by Israeli fireMeanwhile, Hamas is accusing Israel of continuing its attacks and violating the ceasefire.On Friday the Civil Defense, a first responders’ agency operating under the Hamas-run Interior Ministry, said nine people were killed, including women and children, when their vehicle was hit by Israeli fire in Gaza City. The Civil Defense said the car crossed into an Israeli-controlled area in eastern Gaza.As part of the first phase of the ceasefire, Israel still maintains control of about half of Gaza.The Civil Defense said that Israel could have warned the people in a manner that wasn’t lethal. The group recovered the bodies on Saturday with coordination from the U.N., it said.Israel’s army said it saw a “suspicious vehicle” crossing the yellow line and approaching the army’s troops. It said it fired warning shots but the vehicle continued to approach in a manner that posed an “imminent threat.” It says it acted in accordance with the ceasefire.Demands for aidHamas is also urging mediators to increase the flow of aid into Gaza, expedite the opening of the Rafah border crossing with Egypt and start reconstruction of the battered territory.The flow of aid remains constrained because of continued closures of crossings and restrictions on aid groups.United Nations data on Friday showed 339 trucks have been offloaded for distribution in Gaza since the ceasefire began a week ago. Under the agreement, some 600 humanitarian aid trucks would be allowed to enter each day.COGAT, the Israeli defense body overseeing aid in Gaza, reported 950 trucks — including commercial trucks and bilateral deliveries — crossing on Thursday and 716 on Wednesday, the U.N. said.Gaza’s more than 2 million people are hoping the ceasefire will bring relief from the humanitarian disaster caused by Israel’s offensive. Throughout the war, Israel restricted aid entry to Gaza — sometimes halting it altogether.Famine was declared in Gaza City, and the U.N. says it has verified more than 400 people who died of malnutrition-related causes, including more than 100 children.Israel says it let in enough food, accusing Hamas of stealing much of it. The U.N. and other aid agencies deny the claim.Israel’s campaign in Gaza has killed nearly 68,000 Palestinians, according to the Health Ministry, which is part of the Hamas-run government in the territory. Its figures are seen as a reliable estimate of wartime deaths by U.N. agencies and many independent experts. Israel has disputed them without providing its own toll.Thousands more people are missing, according to the Red Cross. Magdy reported from Cairo, Egypt.
DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip —
Israel says the remains of another hostage that Hamas handed over the day before have been identified as Eliyahu Margalit, as the Palestinian militant group looks for more bodies under the rubble in the Gaza Strip and urges more aid to be allowed into the embattled enclave.
Israel’s Prime Minister’s Office said Saturday Margalit’s body was identified after testing by the National Center for Forensic Medicine and his family has been notified. The 76-year-old was abducted on Oct. 7, 2023, when Hamas attacked Israel, from the horse stables where he worked in Kibbutz Nir Oz.
Margalit is the 10th returned hostage body since the ceasefire went into effect over a week ago. Hamas handed over an 11th body this week, but it wasn’t that of a hostage. The effort to find the remains followed a warning from U.S. President Donald Trump that he would green-light Israel to resume the war if Hamas doesn’t live up to its end of the deal and return all hostages’ bodies, totaling 28.
In a statement Saturday, the hostage forum, which supports the families of those abducted, said Margalit’s return brings a measure of solace to his family, but that they won’t rest until the remaining 18 hostages are returned. The forum says it will continue holding weekly rallies until all remains are brought back.
The handover of hostages’ remains, called for under the ceasefire agreement, has been among the key sticking points — along with aid deliveries, the opening of border crossings into Gaza and hopes for reconstruction — in a process backed by much of the international community to help end two years of devastating war in Gaza.
Hamas has said it is committed to the terms of the ceasefire deal, including the handover of bodies. However, the retrieval of bodies is hampered by the scope of the devastation and the presence of dangerous, unexploded ordnance. The group has also told mediators that some bodies are in areas controlled by Israeli troops.
Margalit’s body was found after two bulldozers plowed up pits in the earth in the city of Khan Younis.
Nine Palestinians killed by Israeli fire
Meanwhile, Hamas is accusing Israel of continuing its attacks and violating the ceasefire.
On Friday the Civil Defense, a first responders’ agency operating under the Hamas-run Interior Ministry, said nine people were killed, including women and children, when their vehicle was hit by Israeli fire in Gaza City. The Civil Defense said the car crossed into an Israeli-controlled area in eastern Gaza.
As part of the first phase of the ceasefire, Israel still maintains control of about half of Gaza.
The Civil Defense said that Israel could have warned the people in a manner that wasn’t lethal. The group recovered the bodies on Saturday with coordination from the U.N., it said.
Israel’s army said it saw a “suspicious vehicle” crossing the yellow line and approaching the army’s troops. It said it fired warning shots but the vehicle continued to approach in a manner that posed an “imminent threat.” It says it acted in accordance with the ceasefire.
Demands for aid
Hamas is also urging mediators to increase the flow of aid into Gaza, expedite the opening of the Rafah border crossing with Egypt and start reconstruction of the battered territory.
The flow of aid remains constrained because of continued closures of crossings and restrictions on aid groups.
United Nations data on Friday showed 339 trucks have been offloaded for distribution in Gaza since the ceasefire began a week ago. Under the agreement, some 600 humanitarian aid trucks would be allowed to enter each day.
COGAT, the Israeli defense body overseeing aid in Gaza, reported 950 trucks — including commercial trucks and bilateral deliveries — crossing on Thursday and 716 on Wednesday, the U.N. said.
Gaza’s more than 2 million people are hoping the ceasefire will bring relief from the humanitarian disaster caused by Israel’s offensive. Throughout the war, Israel restricted aid entry to Gaza — sometimes halting it altogether.
Famine was declared in Gaza City, and the U.N. says it has verified more than 400 people who died of malnutrition-related causes, including more than 100 children.
Israel says it let in enough food, accusing Hamas of stealing much of it. The U.N. and other aid agencies deny the claim.
Israel’s campaign in Gaza has killed nearly 68,000 Palestinians, according to the Health Ministry, which is part of the Hamas-run government in the territory. Its figures are seen as a reliable estimate of wartime deaths by U.N. agencies and many independent experts. Israel has disputed them without providing its own toll.
Thousands more people are missing, according to the Red Cross.
In a corner of their ramshackle tent in southern Gaza, Ghaidaa Qudaih and her family keep a baby stroller and three backpacks filled with clothes, diapers, milk and other necessities close at hand. They need them in case they have to run for their lives, as they have 11 times over the past two years.
“Each time, it has been a struggle,” said Qudaih, a 29-year-old vegetable farmer. “Sometimes hope came to us, and sometimes we lost it.”
Hamas has handed over the remains of another deceased hostage, the Israel Defense Forces said.
The IDF confirmed in a social media post early Saturday local time that the “coffin of the deceased hostage” was brought into Israel and was being taken to Israel’s National Institute for Forensic Medicine, where the body would be identified.
“The IDF urges the public to act with sensitivity and wait for official identification, which will first be communicated to the families of the deceased hostages,” the IDF wrote.
In a previous social media post late Friday night, the IDF said that 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’ armed wing, the al-Qassam Brigades, had said earlier Friday that it was handing over the body.
The announcement comes after Hamas said Wednesday it had handed over all the Israeli hostage remains in Gaza that it had been able to recover, and extensive efforts and special equipment would be required to find the remaining bodies.
The Gaza peace plan called for Hamas to hand over all remaining hostages — 20 living and 28 dead — by Monday, Oct. 13. Since the plan took effect last week, Hamas has been accused of delaying handing over the remains of Israeli hostages still believed to be in the Palestinian territory.
Hamas has handed over the remains of at least seven confirmed hostages since the peace deal took effect, not including the body handed over Friday, which still needs to be identified.
People line the streets to pay tribute to Inbar Hayman, who was killed in October 2023, and whose body was taken captive in Gaza, during a funeral procession on Oct. 17, 2025, in Rishon LeZion, Israel. Her remains were returned to Israel this week after the ceasefire between Israel and Hamas.
Chris McGrath / Getty Images
While Hamas returned the 20 living hostages by the Monday deadline, the remains of only four deceased Israeli captives were handed over. Hamas transferred an additional four 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 unaccounted for.
A senior U.S. adviser told reporters on a call Wednesday that “nobody is getting left behind,” noting they believe there are still many bodies buried under the mountains of rubble across Gaza. Senior U.S. advisers said the level of destruction also makes it difficult to move around in the Palestinian territory.
“It would have been almost impossible for Hamas to mobilize, even if they knew where all the 28 bodies were, to mobilize and get them home,” one adviser said Wednesday.
Strikingly, the adviser said the U.S. is sharing Israeli intelligence with Hamas to assist in finding hostage remains. The adviser also said Turkey has offered to help search for and retrieve remains by sending in expert teams with experience rescuing people from the frequent earthquakes in the country.
U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Mike Waltz said Thursday that American personnel would be part of the effort to recover the remains of the hostages that have yet to be turned over.
During negotiations that led to the peace deal, Hamas representatives said they did not know the location of all the remains of 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 out” how to locate an unspecified number of remains.
The senior U.S. advisers who spoke to reporters on Wednesday urged patience and said they are not at a point where they feel that the agreement has been violated, citing the difficulties in retrieving the remains still in Gaza.
Both the Israeli Hostages and Missing Families Forum, the group that represents the hostage families, and Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz have previously said the entire peace deal should be shelved until all of the hostages’ remains are returned by Hamas.
TEL AVIV—At the start of the week, President Trump declared the
“
historic dawn of a new Middle East” after securing a truce between Israel and Hamas that stopped the war in Gaza. Days later, the peace process is already stumbling.
The reason: a controversy over Hamas’s failure to return all of the bodies of dead hostages that remain in Gaza. Israel and the Arab mediators in the talks knew Hamas wasn’t able to locate all of them, but the militant group’s initial decision to return only four looked like foot-dragging to Israel and set off a highly political skirmish amid demands the deal be halted until the bodies were back.
Hamas claims the return of Israeli hostages’ bodies will take time, saying some are buried in destroyed tunnels and others under bombed buildings.
Hamas claimed on Thursday that the return of Israeli hostages’ bodies may take time, as some were buried in tunnels destroyed by Israel, and others remain under the rubble of buildings that Israel bombed and destroyed, adding that the group remained committed to the Gaza agreement and keen to hand over all the remaining bodies of the hostages held in Gaza.
The retrieval of the remaining bodies required equipment to remove rubble, which was currently unavailable due to Israel’s ban on entry of such tools, Hamas added.
Israel will continue refusing to allow a Turkish delegation of 81 rescue personnel and heavy equipment to enter the Gaza Strip until Hamas returns all the remains of deceased hostages that it can, an Israeli official told The Jerusalem Post on Thursday.
Hamas terrorists and Gazan civilians congregate in Jabalya, northern Gaza Strip. January 30, 2025. (credit: REUTERS/MOHAMMED SALEM)
‘Group of hostages’ bodies that Hamas can return right now’
“There is a group of hostages’ bodies that Hamas can return right now [and] another group they know the location of, but they need equipment and assistance to retrieve them,” another source said. “And there are some bodies they genuinely do not know where they are.”
Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar said Thursday: “We know for certain that Hamas can easily release a significant number of hostages in accordance with the agreement. What they are doing now is a fundamental violation of that agreement.”
Hamas has returned only nine of the 28 dead Israeli hostages it promised President Trump. Perhaps the terrorists are busy dealing with the corpses of the Palestinians they have been executing since the cease-fire. Where are the protests now from those in the West who claimed to speak for Gazans?
“Death to Zionism. Death to all collaborators,” the National Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) wrote in an online post Sunday, echoing Hamas’s usual excuse for killing its rivals and dissenters. SJP led the 2024 campus protests in the U.S. and received fawning press coverage for its humanitarian concern.
In the wake of its peace deal with Israel, the terrorist group Hamas is back on the streets of the Gaza Strip in an attempt, it says, to restore law and order, as well as to send a message.
In one video obtained by CBS News on Wednesday, Hamas fighters can be seen among armed men standing over Palestinians they accused of being gang members collaborating with Israel. Moments later, they execute them. The disturbing images are part of a long pattern of punishment meted out to suspected collaborators, according to Israeli hostage negotiator Gershon Baskin.
“Hamas is killing them because they can,” Baskin told CBS News. “Hamas is a criminal organization that has ruled the Palestinian people in Gaza for almost 20 years. This is not a democratic, liberal regime.”
Baskin explains that Palestinian militia groups that are opposed to Hamas had been armed by Israel during the war in an effort to weaken Hamas’ power.
“Israel has empowered, with weapons and money, gangs of Palestinians who were involved in mostly illegal activities in the past — selling drugs, illegal smuggling — and they’ve empowered them as an alternative to Hamas,” Baskin said. “This is not sustainable.”
President Trump on Tuesday appeared to acknowledge that Hamas was engaged in violence against Palestinian militia groups.
“They did take out a couple of gangs that were very bad gangs, very, very bad,” Mr. Trump said of Hamas while speaking with reporters. “And that didn’t bother me much, to be honest with you.”
The U.S. peace deal, still in its first phase, eventually calls for an interim governing body made up of “qualified Palestinians and international experts” and overseen by a “Board of Peace” chaired by Mr. Trump, but that has yet to be established. “There is no governance in Gaza, there are no schools, there are no government ministries, there’s nowhere for anyone to go to get any help,” Baskin said. “There is a vacuum of a governance in Gaza right now.”
Five days after the start of a ceasefire in the Gaza Strip, tens of thousands of people in Spain took part in a strike on Wednesday to protest Israel’s military action in the coastal territory.
Trade unions called on people to stop work for two hours at a time in the morning, around lunchtime and in the evening.
Besides slight delays to local transport and short interruptions to television broadcasts, there were no major reports of disruption to public life.
Demonstrations were held in large cities including Madrid, Bilbao and Barcelona, each of which counting several thousand participants.
In Barcelona, broadcaster RTVE reported that protesters clashed with police, with officers using pepper stray against people who tried to enter a train station.
Some demonstrators threw bottles at the police, according to the newspaper La Vanguardia.
Demonstrators also set fire to some of the large plastic containers for household waste that can be found on almost every corner in Barcelona.
Spain is one of the European Union’s harshest critics of Israel’s military action in the Gaza Strip. The country has imposed an arms embargo on Israel and issued entry bans for far-right members of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government.
Left-wing Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez accuses Israel of committing genocide in Gaza.
The Gaza war was triggered by the massacre carried out by Hamas and other extremists from the Gaza Strip in Israel on October 7, 2023, which saw around 1,200 people killed and some 250 others taken hostage.
Israel responded by launching a massive offensive against Hamas in the densely population territory, which Palestinian sources say has killed more than 67,000 people, mainly civilians.
People with banners and Palestinian flags march between Atocha and Callao in solidarity with Palestine. Richard Zubelzu/ZUMA Press Wire/dpa
People Palestinian flags during a united march of pro-Palestinian entities, organized by Prou complicitat amb Israel, in favor of Palestine. David Zorrakino/EUROPA PRESS/dpa
Riot police detain demonstrators during riots at a united march of pro-Palestinian entities, organized by Prou complicitat amb Israel, in favor of Palestine. David Zorrakino/EUROPA PRESS/dpa
Israel and Hamas began negotiating the second phase of a plan outlined by President Trump to end the war in Gaza, as debates continued about the militant group’s
failure to return all the bodies of dead hostages as required in the first phase.
On Wednesday morning, Israel said three bodies turned over by Hamas a day earlier were Israeli hostages, but that a fourth body wasn’t a match.
A U.S.-brokered cease-fire has hit pause on the war between Hamas and Israel. In its place, a fight between Hamas and other armed Palestinian groups in the Gaza Strip is now under way.
As Israeli troops pulled back last week to facilitate a deal that freed the living hostages still held in Gaza, Hamas surged security forces in behind them—a public assertion of authority intended to make clear the group remains the enclave’s governing power.
The Palestinian Authority “strongly condemned” the reported field executions carried out by Hamas in the Gaza Strip, a statement shared by the Palestinian News and Information Agency (WAFA) said.
The Palestinian Authority presidency issued an unusually sharp denunciation of Hamas on Tuesday night, condemning what it called “field executions” carried out in the Gaza Strip in recent days and demanding accountability under Palestinian law.
In a statement carried PA state agency WAFA, the presidency said it “strongly condemns the recent field executions carried out by Hamas in the Gaza Strip, which claimed the lives of dozens of citizens outside the framework of the law and without fair trials,” calling the acts “heinous crimes that are utterly rejected under any pretext.”
The statement framed the reported killings as “a blatant violation of human rights” and “a grave breach of the rule of law,” asserting they reflect “the movement’s determination to impose its authority through force and terror, at a time when the people in Gaza are enduring the hardships of war, destruction, and siege.”
It urged an immediate halt to the violations, protection for civilians, and legal action against “all those involved in these crimes within the framework of the law and the legitimate Palestinian judiciary.”
Hamas police officers stand guard, amid a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, in Gaza City, October 11, 2025. (credit: Stringer/Reuters)
PA calls Gaza an integral part of the State of Palestine
Underscoring the PA’s claim to national responsibility, the presidency said Gaza “is an integral part of the State of Palestine” and argued that restoring “the rule of law and legitimate institutions” in the territory is the only path to ending chaos and rebuilding public trust “on the basis of justice, accountability, and respect for the dignity of the Palestinian people.”
It held Hamas “fully responsible for these crimes,” saying they harm “the supreme interests of the Palestinian people,” entrench the group’s control in Gaza, “provide pretexts to the occupation,” obstruct reconstruction, deepen internal division, and “hinder the establishment of a free and independent State of Palestine.”
The PA statement did not specify the number of people allegedly executed, nor provide names or independent documentation. Hamas did not immediately issue a response to the presidency’s condemnation.
WAFA’s bulletin emphasized that accountability should occur “within the framework of the law” and the “legitimate Palestinian judiciary,” signaling the PA’s position that only formally mandated courts can impose criminal penalties and that any executions carried out without due process violate Palestinian and international norms.
More remains of Israeli hostages were handed over by Hamas on Tuesday, as part of a U.S.-brokered deal aimed at keeping peace in Gaza, Israeli authorities said.
Four coffins of deceased hostages were transferred to the Red Cross and were on their way to the Israel Defense Forces and Israel Security Agency in the Gaza Strip, according to a joint statement from the IDF and ISA, citing information provided by the Red Cross.
“Hamas is required to uphold the agreement and take the necessary steps to return the hostages,” the statement reads.
The office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also confirmed in a statement late Tuesday night local time that the remains of the four hostages had been handed over.
The remains “will be received in military status with the Chief Military Rabbi,” Netanyahu’s office said, after which they will be transferred to the Israeli Ministry of Health’s National Center for Forensic Medicine for identification.
Once they are identified, the families of the victims will be notified, Netanyahu’s office said.
The return of the hostages is a cornerstone of the Gaza peace plan, which called for Hamas to hand over all remaining hostages – 20 living and 28 dead – by Monday, Oct. 13.
With those being handed over Tuesday, Hamas will have now released the remains of eight deceased hostages to Israel.
Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said in a social media post on Monday that Hamas’ return of only four bodies constituted “a violation of the agreement” and added that “any delay or deliberate avoidance will be considered a gross violation of the agreement and will be responded to accordingly.”
People gather in hostage square, on the first day after all living hostages were released and returned, on Oct. 14, 2025, in Tel Aviv, Israel.
Alexi Rosenfeld/Getty Images
During negotiations that led to the deal, Hamas representatives said they did not know the location of all the remains of 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 out” how to locate an unspecified number of remains.
Gal Hirsch, the Hostage and Missing Persons Coordinator for the Israeli Prime Minister’s Office, told CBS News last week that an international team would be established to locate missing hostages in Gaza, but details as to who will form that team and when it might begin its work remained unconfirmed on Tuesday.
The Hostages and Missing Families Forum, which represents Israeli hostage families, has voiced anger that all of the bodies have not been returned and called on the U.S. to leave “no stone unturned in demanding that Hamas fulfil their end of the agreement and bring all of the remaining hostages home.”
In exchange for Israeli hostages, the peace deal stipulated that Israel release nearly 2,000 Palestinian detainees and prisoners held by Israel. It also called for a surge of humanitarian aid to Gaza, and a partial pullback by Israeli forces from the Palestinian territory’s main cities – which happened on Friday and kicked off a three-day window for the return of Israeli hostages.
TEL AVIV—Israel and Hamas on Tuesday accused each other of violating the cease-fire that was part of the deal that
released all 20 living hostages from Gaza, with Israel reducing the humanitarian aid promised under the agreement to increase pressure on Hamas to return more bodies of deceased hostages.
Israelis celebrated the return of the living hostages on Monday, in what for many marked an end to the two-year Gaza war. But the families of the deceased hostages who are supposed to be returned to Israel as part of President Trump’s 20-point plan for peace said they were angered that only four of 28 bodies had been returned.
The next phase of the Gaza peace plan brokered by President Trump moved forward significantly on Monday as Hamas released all of the 20 living Israeli hostages in exchange for hundreds of Palestinian prisoners, and as more aid started to flow into the Palestinian territory after two years of war.
The steps are crucial parts of President Trump’s 20-point peace plan, and they came three days after a ceasefire took effect in Gaza and Israeli troops pulled back to a pre-determined line.
World leaders, including Mr. Trump, were meeting in Egypt on Monday for a summit on the future of Gaza and the broader Middle East.
But the situation remains fragile, with major questions over what comes next still to be answered.
Negotiations over next steps
Israel and Hamas have little trust in each other, and it took a number of failed, indirect negotiations in Doha, Qatar’s capital, to get to the truce, with Egypt and Qatar acting as meditators.
The initial phases of the agreement called for: the release of the final hostages held by Hamas, living and dead; the release of hundreds of Palestinian prisoners held by Israel; a surge of humanitarian aid to Gaza; and a partial pullback by Israeli forces from Gaza’s main cities.
Egypt’s foreign minister said on Monday that it was crucial that Israel and Hamas fully implement the first phase of the deal so that the parties can start negotiations on the second phase. As of Monday evening, all living hostages were back in Israel, but the remains of many of the slain captives remained in Gaza.
Later phases of the plan will have to address thornier issues such as Gaza’s postwar governance, Israel’s demand that Hamas disarm, which the group has rejected, and Palestinian demands for a state, which the current Israeli government has rejected.
Negotiations over those issues could break down, and Israel has hinted it may resume military operations if its demands are not met.
President Trump’s plan to end the war also stipulates that regional and international partners will work to develop the core of a new Palestinian security force.
Reconstruction will be another major challenge. The World Bank, and a postwar plan proposed by Egypt, estimates that at least $53 billion will be needed to rebuild the shattered Palestinian territory. Egypt plans to host a future reconstruction conference.
Will Hamas disarm?
Among the most difficult issues is Israel’s insistence that a weakened Hamas completely disarm. Hamas refuses to do that and wants to ensure Israel pulls its troops completely out of Gaza.
So far, the Israeli military has withdrawn from Gaza City, the southern city of Khan Younis and other areas, but it remains in control of about 53% of the enclave, according to Israeli officials. Troops remain in most of the southern city of Rafah, towns of Gaza’s far north, and a wide strip along the length of Gaza’s border with Israel.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Friday that Israel was “tightening the noose around Hamas from all sides,” and vowed that Gaza would be demilitarized after the Israeli government approved the peace plan, which it did hours later.
“Hamas will disarm and Gaza will be demilitarized. If this can be achieved the easy way, all the better; if not, it will be achieved the hard way,” Netanyahu said, addressing reporters.
Who will govern Gaza?
Israel and Hamas have not agreed on Gaza’s postwar governance.
Under the U.S. plan, an international body is supposed to govern the Palestinian territory, overseeing Palestinian technocrats running day-to-day affairs. Hamas and other factions would not have any role in Gaza’s governance.
The plan envisions an eventual role for Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas’ Palestinian Authority — something Netanyahu has long opposed. But it requires the authority, which administers parts of the West Bank, to first undergo a sweeping reform program, and it does not provide any timeline for the process.
Hamas has said Gaza’s government should be worked out among Palestinians.
The deal also recognizes an independent Palestinian state as, “the aspiration of the Palestinian people,” but it’s unclear if or when discussions on statehood could take place, and Israel’s Netanyahu has repeatedly said he will not allow the creation of a Palestinian state.
International security force
The plan calls for an Arab-led international security force in Gaza, along with Palestinian police trained by Egypt and Jordan. It says Israeli forces will leave additional areas as those forces deploy.
Under the plan, the force would work with Israel and Egypt to help secure border areas, along with the newly trained Palestinian police forces.
Egyptian Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty said the international force needs a U.N. Security Council resolution to endorse its deployment and mandate as a peacekeeping force.
About 200 U.S. troops are now in Israel to monitor the ceasefire and the early stages of the peace plan. They were expected to carry out that work in conjunction with partner nations, nongovernmental organizations and private-sector players.
