Hamas might not return all deceased hostages: report

Hamas might not return all the bodies of the deceased hostages in Gaza as part of President Donald Trump’s peace deal, according to Israeli officials. 

Three unnamed Israeli sources reportedly told CNN this week that the Israeli government knows, due to its intelligence reports, that Hamas might not know the location of and is unable to retrieve the bodies of the 28 deceased hostages. 

Hamas leaders and mediators conveyed during recent negotiations that the terrorist group doesn’t know the location of some of the deceased hostages. Of the captives still in Gaza, 20 are believed to be alive, but there are “grave concerns” for the well-being of two of them, CNN reported. 

According to the three Israeli sources, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his cabinet, as well as the U.S. government, have known for months that the terror group might not be able to retrieve all of the hostages’ bodies. 

Negotiators during President Joe Biden’s administration knew about this challenge, according to CNN, which reported that some of the hostages were held captive by factions in Gaza that Hamas doesn’t control. 

Under the terms of Trump’s peace plan, Hamas is supposed to return all of the hostages within 72 hours of the deal going into effect. 

Multiple countries — including Turkey, Israel, the U.S., Qatar and Egypt — will participate in a joint multinational task force to try and locate the missing remains of the deceased hostages in Gaza, according to The Times of Israel. 

The formation of the task force was decided during negotiations in Sharm el-Sheik, Egypt, that also resulted in the peace deal and agreement to release the hostages, according to the outlet.

During a Thursday cabinet meeting, Trump discussed the peace plan and said the hostages who are still alive and held captive by Hamas in Gaza are expected to be released on Monday or Tuesday. Trump also said that he has plans to attend a signing ceremony in Egypt for the agreement.

“Last night, we reached a momentous breakthrough in the Middle East, something that people said was never going to be done,” Trump told reporters. “We ended the war in Gaza, and really, on a much bigger basis, created peace.”

The president acknowledged the difficulties in securing the release of the 28 deceased hostages, noting that some are going to be “a little bit hard to find.”

“But we have the hostages for the most part, and I don’t think it’s going to be an overly big situation with the bodies …,” Trump said. “But we’re going to do the best we can.” 

Israel’s Ministry of Justice published a list this week of the 250 Palestinian terrorists it has agreed to release as part of the deal. The terrorists set to be released include individuals convicted of murder, kidnapping, weapons offenses and various other crimes. 

In addition to releasing the 250 prisoners, Israel has agreed to transfer the bodies of 360 Palestinian terrorists to the Gaza Strip, according to Government Decision No. 3396. 

Also part of the peace plan, Israel has also agreed to release 1,700 detainees from the Gaza Strip who were arrested after the Hamas-led terror attacks on Oct. 7, 2023, but were not involved in the massacre. 

Israeli hostages released through previous deals during the war have spoken out about the starvation and abuse they faced throughout their time in captivity. 

Keith Siegel, one of three hostages released as part of a deal at the beginning of February, said that the brutality that he and the other captives had to endure still haunts him. 

“The images of medieval torture, the echoes of suffering, they do not fade,” Siegel said during a Tuesday vigil at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., commemorating the second anniversary of Hamas’ terror attacks. 

“We were trapped in suffocating tunnels, left alone, 130 feet underground. We were starved, denied water, beaten, held in unbearable conditions, forced to make propaganda videos and pressured to convert to Islam,” the freed hostage stated.