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Israel appeared on Wednesday to be restricting the flow of humanitarian aid into Gaza in response to what it says is Hamas’ delay in handing over the remains of 21 other hostages still believed to be in the Palestinian territory. Some people fear that may not be possible.
An Israeli security official told CBS News on Wednesday that, “contrary to reports, the Rafah Crossing did not open today,” referring to the key portal to Gaza from Egypt, where tons of aid has been stockpiled ready for delivery for weeks.
The official said preparations were ongoing for the crossing to open “for the exit and entry of Gazans only,” but not for aid materials. However, the official said an unspecified amount of aid was still being transported into Gaza through the Kerem Shalom crossing, “and other crossings after Israeli security inspection.”
Calls have mounted since the U.S.-brokered ceasefire took effect on Friday for Israel to allow “full aid” into Gaza, as specified under the terms of President Trump’s 20-point peace plan.
Israeli officials had said that 600 aid trucks per day would be permitted to enter the territory once the U.S.-brokered peace plan took effect. The Israeli government has not given details on the level of aid traffic it has allowed through since then, but there are reports that only half as many trucks have passed into Gaza each day.
Both the Israeli Hostages and Missing Families Forum, the group which represents the hostage families, and Israel’s defense minister have said the entire peace deal should be shelved until all of the hostages’ remains are returned by Hamas.
Amir Levy/Getty
The Israel Defense Forces, in multiple statements about the return of hostages since Friday, has said only that “Hamas is required to make all necessary efforts to return the deceased hostages.”
Hamas did return several four more sets of remains on Tuesday evening, but the Israeli military said Wednesday that one of them was not one of the missing hostages.
That would mean the remains of 21 hostages still lie buried somewhere amid the ruins of Gaza, along with more than 11,000 Gazans who remain missing, according to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics. Part of the problem is that many of those who oversaw the burial of the deceased hostages are now dead themselves.
“Many of the Hamas commanders who are responsible for burying these Israeli hostages are no longer alive,” Israeli hostage negotiator Gershon Baskin told CBS News on Wednesday. “They were killed by the Israelis.”
He said there were still “thousands of Gazans who are unaccounted for, who are believed to be buried underneath the rubble of the buildings Israel bombed,” too.
During negotiations to seal the Middle East peace deal, Hamas representatives said they did not know the location of all the remains of deceased hostages, according to Israeli media.
Abed Rahim Khatib/picture alliance/Getty 
On the ground in Gaza, first responders who spent the past two years rushing in to save lives are now searching for the dead. It’s a gargantuan task as the Hamas-run territory’s government estimates that at least 90% of Gaza’s buildings have been damaged or destroyed — and most of the search teams only have rudimentary tools.
“They are just digging with their hands,” one man searching for lost loved ones told CBS News’ team Gaza. “We are exhausted from this and don’t have the energy anymore.”
He is just one of thousands of Gazans trying to find missing relatives.
“It’s very likely that there might be Israeli bodies underneath the rubble as well,” Baskin told CBS News. “Some of the deceased hostages may never be found, and that’s part of the reality, but we have to make sure that Hamas is doing everything possible to do it.”
“When I brought this to the attention of [U.S. senior envoy] Mr. Witkoff last night, I told him this is gonna be an issue. The Israelis are already screaming that Hamas is breaching the agreement,” Baskin said. “Witkoff said to me, ‘we will not allow that to happen.’ I know that the Egyptians have taken this very seriously. I understand that there are some Egyptians who entered Gaza today to work with Hamas to try and find the bodies. This has to be resolved, and it has to be resolved quickly.”
Trump says “we will disarm” Hamas, as group reasserts power
The U.S. plan also calls for an interim governing body, headed by President Trump, to administer Gaza for an undefined period before handing over to Palestinian control. But this interim body has yet to be established, and Hamas has already begun to fill the resulting power vacuum.
CBS News has seen armed members of the group back on the streets of Gaza.
Dawoud Abu Alkas/REUTERS 
Videos have emerged, which CBS News has been unable to verify independently, apparently showing Hamas members executing blindfolded Palestinians accused of collaborating with Israel, in front of crowds of people. There have also been reports of Hamas attacking rival armed groups and gangs.
“Hamas is killing them because it can,” Baskin told CBS News. “Israel has empowered, with weapons and money, gangs of Palestinians who were involved in mostly illegal activities in the past … and they’ve empowered them as an alternative to Hamas.”
President Trump reacted to the videos on Tuesday, saying recently that Hamas “did take out a couple of gangs, that were very bad gangs, very, very bad … and that didn’t bother me much to be honest with you.”
“But we have told them we want to disarm and they will disarm,” Mr. Trump said. “And if they don’t disarm, we will disarm them, and it’ll happen quickly and perhaps violently.”
Adm. Brad Cooper, the commander of the U.S. military’s Central Command, urged Hamas on Wednesday to “immediately suspend violence and shooting at innocent Palestinian civilians in Gaza — in both Hamas-held parts of Gaza and those secured by the IDF [Israeli military] behind the Yellow Line.”
“This is an historic opportunity for peace. Hamas should seize it by fully standing down, strictly adhering to President Trump’s 20-point peace plan, and disarming without delay,” Cooper said in a statement shared on social media. “We have conveyed our concerns to the mediators who agreed to work with us to enforce the peace and protect innocent Gaza civilians. We remain highly optimistic for the future of peace in the region.”
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