On October 31, 2025, the Prime Minister’s Office of Israel announced on Thursday (October 30) that earlier in the day, Hamas had transferred the bodies of two hostages who died while in captivity in Gaza to Israel through the International Red Cross.
According to the statement from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office, after Hamas handed over the bodies to the Red Cross in Gaza, the bodies were received by the Israeli military and taken to relevant institutions for identification.
As part of the first-stage ceasefire agreement reached between Israel and Hamas, Hamas released all living hostages in exchange for nearly 2,000 Palestinian prisoners held by Israel. At the same time, Israel withdrew some troops, paused attacks, and increased aid to Gaza.
Under the agreement, Hamas is also required to return the bodies of all 28 deceased hostages in exchange for the bodies of 360 Palestinian militants killed in the war.
The return of hostages is a cornerstone of the Gaza peace plan, which originally demanded that Hamas hand over all remaining hostages by October 13, whether alive or deceased, including 20 survivors and 28 deceased.
However, as of this Thursday, Hamas has only handed over 15 bodies. If the latest transfer of two bodies is confirmed to be those of deceased hostages, then there are still 11 hostage bodies waiting to be returned from Gaza.
Since the implementation of the Gaza ceasefire agreement, Israel has repeatedly accused Hamas of violating the agreement, with a significant aspect being Hamas’s failure to return all deceased hostage bodies within the specified deadline.
Additionally, over the past two weeks, both sides have accused each other of violating the agreement multiple times, leading to several clashes. The most recent incident occurred on Tuesday when an Israeli soldier was killed in a Hamas attack in Rafah in southern Gaza, prompting Israel to launch a new round of airstrikes on Gaza.
However, Hamas has claimed that it was not involved in the attack on the Israeli soldier in the Rafah area.
Initially, Hamas agreed to hand over all the bodies of deceased hostages, but later stated that due to the destruction of facilities in Gaza during the war and the destruction of some tunnels in the fighting, the organization was unable to locate or retrieve some of the hostage bodies.
The Israeli military is currently transporting the newly received bodies of deceased hostages and will transfer them to the National Center for Forensic Medicine in Tel Aviv for identification.