The US has downplayed claims that Hamas is violating the ceasefire deal with Israel by not returning all the bodies of dead hostages.
Only nine of the 28 dead hostages have been returned, with Hamas saying it needs time and specialised equipment to recover the others from the ruins of Gaza.
The latest two bodies returned on Wednesday have been identified as Inbar Hayman and Sgt Maj Muhammad al-Atarash, the Israel Defense Forces said early on Thursday.
The row over the return of dead hostages has led Israel to limit promised aid supplies to Gaza, but two senior advisers to US President Donald Trump have said plans to demilitarise the Strip and build a new transitional government are under way.
In an update on the implementation of Trump’s 20-point peace plan, the advisers told reporters that the US government did not so far believe Hamas had broken the agreement by not retrieving more remains.
The advisers argued that Hamas had acted in good faith by returning all living hostages and was working with various interlocutors to find and return the remains of the others.
Hamas’s armed wing said in a statement it was committed to the deal but had returned all the bodies of hostages it was able to reach.
One senior US adviser said the recovery of all the bodies could take weeks because of the level of destruction in Gaza.
He said rewards might be offered for Gazan civilians who gave information and that Turkish experts were expected to join the search.
Confirming the return of two more deceased hostages on Thursday, the IDF said Hayman was 27 when she was killed by Hamas on 7 October 2023 at the Nova festival. Her body was taken into the Gaza Strip.
Sgt Maj al-Atarash, who was 39, fell in combat on the same day, the IDF said.
“Hamas is required to fulfill its part of the agreement and make the necessary efforts to return all the hostages to their families and to a dignified burial,” it added.
In a statement, the Hostages Families Forum said: “The families of the hostages and of those released embrace the families of Inbar Hayman and Muhammad al-Atarash, whose loved ones came home yesterday for proper burial in Israel.
“Alongside the grief and the understanding that their hearts will never be whole, the return of Inbar and Muhammad, may their memories be a blessing, brings some measure of comfort to families who have lived with agonising uncertainty for over two years.
“We will not rest until all 19 hostages are brought home.”
Hamas is required to return all 28 dead hostages as part of the first phase of the Gaza peace plan.
But Hamas’s armed wing said in a statement “the remaining bodies require significant efforts and specialised equipment to search for and retrieve, and we are making a great effort to close this file”.
Earlier, Israel said it would “not compromise” on hostage returns, saying “the mission is not complete”.
Israel’s defence minister said he had instructed the IDF to prepare a “comprehensive plan” to defeat Hamas in Gaza in the event of a renewal of the war.
After meeting senior generals on Wednesday, Israel Katz said the military must be prepared to act if Hamas refuses to implement the peace plan.
The latest repatriations came after Israel said one of four bodies returned by Hamas on Tuesday was not one of the missing hostages.
UN humanitarian chief Tom Fletcher has urged Israel to immediately open all border crossings into Gaza for humanitarian aid, as called for in the ceasefire plan.
In a post on X, Fletcher said Hamas must “make strenuous efforts to return all the bodies of the deceased hostages”.
He added: “As Israel has agreed, they must allow the massive surge of humanitarian aid – thousands of trucks a week – on which so many lives depend, and on which the world has insisted.”
He called for “a genuine, practical, problem-solving approach to removing remaining obstacles” and said “withholding aid from civilians is not a bargaining chip”.
Trump’s ceasefire plan, which both Israel and Hamas accepted, envisaged the handover of all 48 hostages would be completed by noon on Monday. Hamas returned all the 20 living hostages on Monday.
But the US-brokered ceasefire agreement appears to acknowledge that Hamas and other Palestinian factions may not have been able to find all hostage remains before the initial deadline on Monday.
Under the agreement, Israel also agreed to hand over the bodies of 15 Palestinians in return for every deceased Israeli hostage.
So far, Israel has returned the bodies of 90 Palestinians in exchange for the Israeli hostages’ remains.
Meanwhile in Gaza, residents report growing concern about the durability of the ceasefire – and food prices have surged as Palestinians stockpile food.
Traders and suppliers in the enclave have been hoarding food items to create shortages and drive up profits, fearing that the war could resume, local residents told the BBC.
“Every time we start to feel safe, new threats appear, and we fear the war will start all over again,” says mother-of-six Neven Al-Mughrabi, a displaced resident from Gaza who lives in Khan Younis.
“I lost my house in Gaza City, I decided to stay here with my family because I don’t trust the ceasefire and we’re sick of displacement.”
She added that a trader in Khan Younis’s main market said demand for flour, oil and sugar had surged within hours. “Despite the sudden rise of prices by about 30%, people are buying as if they don’t trust the calm will last long, everyone is afraid aid will stop,” Neven says.
