The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) accompanied members of Hamas inside areas of Gaza still under the control of the Israeli military to facilitate the search for the bodies of Israeli hostages, an official from the ICRC told the Guardian.
Under the US-brokered ceasefire, which took effect on 10 October, Hamas is required to return the remains of all Israeli hostages as soon as possible. In exchange, Israel has agreed to hand over 15 Palestinian bodies for each Israeli.
Hamas has so far returned the remains of 15 of those held captive but none in the past five days, as some of those bodies are believed to be in areas beyond the yellow line marking Gaza’s ceasefire.
‘‘At the request of the parties, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) yesterday accompanied a party to the conflict as the party searched for the remains of the deceased past the IDF-designated ‘yellow line’, said Sarah Davies, a ICRC spokesperson.
“The parties to the conflict determined the modalities of the operation and entrusted the ICRC to act as a neutral intermediary. The ICRC was not involved in those negotiations.”
Davies added: “The ICRC was not involved in the search for the deceased nor does it take part in the physical recovery of remains.”
A Red Cross official confirmed to the Guardian that the party cited in their statement was Hamas.
Under international humanitarian law, it is the responsibility of the parties involved in a conflict to search for, collect, and retrieve human remains.
On Saturday, the US president, Donald Trump, issued a 48-hour ultimatum to the militant group. “Hamas is going to have to start returning the bodies of the deceased hostages, including two Americans, quickly, or the other countries involved in this great peace will take action,” Trump wrote on his social‑media platform.
As the 48-hour deadline neared, Hamas, accompanied by the ICRC, joined Egyptian teams, who were authorised on Sunday by Israel to search for remains beyond the line marking the Israeli military’s pullback inside Gaza. An Israeli spokesperson said the Egyptian team would use excavator machines and trucks in the search.
The news was corroborated by an unnamed Israeli official, who told Hebrew-language media that Hamas representatives had been permitted to enter areas of Gaza under Israel Defense Forces (IDF) control to search for the bodies of hostages, alongside Egyptian and Red Cross teams.
“For this purpose, Hamas members were allowed to cross the yellow line,” the official was quoted as saying by Army Radio.
Footage published by Qatar’s Al-Araby network appeared to show members of Hamas’s “Shadow Unit” – part of the group’s military wing tasked with guarding hostages – accompanying a Red Cross vehicle in al-Mawasi near Rafah, which lies outside Israeli military control.
Contacted by the Guardian about the reported presence of Hamas representatives in areas under Israeli control to search for the remains of hostages, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The search for the bodies of Israeli hostages taken by Hamas has become one of the most sensitive issues in the ceasefire agreed between the two sides. Yet the effort to locate the remains has proved difficult from the outset, given the presence of an estimated 60m tonnes of debris across the strip, where, according to Gaza’s health ministry, at least 10,000 Palestinians are recorded as missing, buried under the rubble.
Hamas has claimed it does not know the precise whereabouts of all the bodies, saying it has lost contact with several of its units that had been holding the captives and were reportedly killed during Israeli bombardments.
However, on Sunday, an Israeli government spokesperson claimed Hamas knew the whereabouts of the bodies. “If Hamas made more of an effort, they would be able to retrieve the remains of our hostages,” the spokesperson said.
Although Trump has conceded that some of the bodies are difficult to reach, the US president said that “others they can return now and, for some reason, they are not”.
“It may have to do with the disarming of Hamas,” he added.
Washington has said it has received assurances from Hamas that the group will disarm, though no clear timeline has been set. The militant organisation remains reluctant to surrender its weapons without firm guarantees about the future of its fighters.
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