Hostages

The Red Cross has received two bodies in Gaza that Hamas says are hostages, the Israeli military has said.

The remains will be returned to Israel and formally identified. Hamas earlier said the bodies had been recovered in the Palestinian territory on Saturday.

The two individuals bring the total number of deceased hostages returned to Israel to 12. The remains of a further 16 people are yet to be repatriated.

The delay has caused outrage in Israel, as the terms of last week’s ceasefire deal stipulated the release from Gaza of all hostages, living and dead. Hamas says it has struggled to find the remaining bodies under rubble.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office has ordered the Rafah border crossing between Gaza and Egypt to remain closed until further notice, and said its reopening would be considered based on the return of the final hostage remains and the implementation of the ceasefire agreement.

The IDF has stressed that Hamas must “uphold the agreement and take the necessary steps to return all the hostages”.

But the US has downplayed suggestions that the delay amounts to a breach of the ceasefire deal, which President Donald Trump claimed as a major victory on a visit to Israel and Egypt last week.

The text of the deal has not been published, but a leaked version that was seen in Israeli media appeared to account for the possibility that not all of the bodies would be immediately accessible.

Hamas has blamed Israel for making the task difficult, as air strikes on Gaza have reduced many buildings to rubble, and Israel does not allow heavy machinery and diggers into the territory.

UN humanitarian chief Tom Fletcher told the BBC News Channel that the Gaza Strip “is now a wasteland”, with people picking through the rubble for bodies and trying to find their homes – many of which have been flattened.

As part of the US-brokered ceasefire deal, Hamas also returned all 20 living hostages to Israel.

Israel’s military confirmed the identity of the tenth deceased hostage returned by Hamas on Friday. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) named him as Eliyahu Margalit, whose body was taken from Nir Oz kibbutz after he was killed on 7 October 2023.

Also as part of the deal, Israel freed 250 Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails and 1,718 detainees from Gaza.

The bodies of 15 Palestinians were handed over by Israel via the Red Cross to officials in Gaza on Saturday, the Hamas-run health ministry said, bringing the total number of bodies it has received to 135.

Separately on Saturday, 11 members of one Palestinian family were killed by an Israeli tank shell, according to the Hamas-run civil defence ministry, in what was the deadliest single incident involving Israeli soldiers in Gaza since the start of the ceasefire.

The Israeli military said soldiers had fired at a “suspicious vehicle” that had crossed the so-called yellow line demarcating the area still occupied by Israeli forces in Gaza.

There are no physical markers of this line, and it is unclear if the bus did cross it. The BBC has asked the IDF for the coordinates of the incident.

The Israeli military launched a campaign in Gaza in response to the 7 October 2023 attack, in which Hamas-led gunmen killed about 1,200 people in southern Israel and took 251 others hostage.

At least 68,000 people have been killed by Israeli attacks in Gaza since then, according to the Hamas-run health ministry, whose figures are seen by the UN as reliable.

In September, a UN commission of inquiry said Israel had committed genocide against Palestinians in Gaza. Israel categorically rejected the report as “distorted and false”.

US President Donald Trump has said “the war is over” as he travels to Israel for the release of hostages from Gaza under the ceasefire deal agreed between Israel and Hamas.

Speaking on board Air Force One, he said the ceasefire would hold and a “Board of Peace” would quickly be set up for Gaza, which he said looked like a “demolition site”.

He also praised the roles of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Qatar, one of the mediators.

The deadline for Hamas to release all the hostages it is still holding in Gaza is midday local time (10:00 BST). Later on Monday, Trump will travel to Egypt for an international summit aiming to end the war.

The war was triggered by the Hamas-led attacks on southern Israel on 7 October 2023, in which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 taken hostage.

Since then, more than 67,000 Palestinians have been killed by Israel’s military response, including more than 18,000 children, the Hamas-run health ministry says.

The ceasefire in Gaza took effect on Friday morning after Israel and Hamas agreed to the first phase of the 20-point peace plan brokered by Trump, with the next phases still to be negotiated.

Twenty of the Israeli hostages are believed to be alive, and Hamas is also due to hand over the remains of up to 28 deceased hostages.

Israel should also release around 250 Palestinian prisoners and 1,700 detainees from Gaza, while increased amounts of aid should enter the Strip. An Israeli government spokesperson said they would be released once the living hostages reach Israeli territory.

When asked by the BBC whether he believed the ceasefire would hold, he said it would, adding “everybody is happy, and I think it’s going to stay that way”.

On his peace skills, Trump said: “I’m good at solving wars. I’m good at making peace.”

Asked if he would ever visit Gaza, Trump said he would. “I’d like to put my feet on it, at least.” Trump said he thought Gaza would be a “miracle” over the coming decades.

He added that the region would soon “normalise,” with a planned supervisory body – the Board of Peace – to be established “very quickly” to oversee Gaza.

On Saturday hundreds of thousands of Israelis attended a rally in Tel Aviv and chanted their gratitude to the US leader.

Many details for the later phases of the peace plan could be hard to reach agreement on – such as the governance of Gaza, the extent of Israeli troop withdrawal, and the disarming of Hamas.

Trump will land in Israel on Monday, where he will address the country’s parliament the Knesset.

He will then travel to lead a summit in Sharm el-Sheikh alongside Egypt’s President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi.

Egypt’s foreign ministry said a “document ending the war in the Gaza Strip” was expected to be signed.

Leaders from more than 20 countries are expected to attend, including UK Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.

Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz said that once the hostages were returned, the military would destroy underground tunnels in Gaza built by Hamas.

Aid trucks began entering Gaza on Sunday and hundreds more were queuing at the border.

Palestinians crowded around the convoys arriving in Khan Younis, southern Gaza.

Speaking to the BBC earlier on Sunday, Unicef’s James Elder said dozens of trucks had entered the Strip but that this fell short of what was needed.

The UN estimates that at least 600 aid trucks are needed every day to start addressing Gaza’s humanitarian crisis.

In August, the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) declared a famine in parts of the territory, including Gaza City.

Israel, however, rejects the IPC report, and its foreign ministry says the conclusions are “based on Hamas lies”. Israeli military aid body Cogat says the report ignores the “extensive humanitarian efforts undertaken in Gaza”.

Palestinians returning to northern Gaza have described scenes of devastation, with many of them finding their homes reduced to rubble. Rescue workers have warned there could be unexploded ordnance and bombs in the area.

Amjad Al Shawa, who heads a Palestinian organisation coordinating with aid groups, estimated 300,000 tents were needed to temporarily house 1.5 million displaced Gazans.

Hamas has recalled about 7,000 members of its security forces to reassert control over areas of Gaza recently vacated by Israeli troops, according to local sources.

At least 27 people have been killed in fierce clashes between Hamas security forces and armed members of the Dughmush family in Gaza City, in one of the most violent internal confrontations since the end of major Israeli operations in the enclave.