Israel hands over bodies of 30 Palestinians as ceasefire agreement edges forward

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DEIR AL-BALAH, Gaza Strip (AP) — Israel returned the bodies of 30 Palestinians to health authorities in Gaza on Friday, completing an exchange after militants turned over remains of two hostages, in a sign that the tense Israel-Hamas ceasefire agreement is edging forward.

The incremental progress came despite Israeli strikes on Gaza this week that killed more than 100 people following the killing of an Israeli soldier.

The bodies were transferred with the Red Cross serving as intermediary. The return of the Palestinian remains was confirmed by a doctor at Nasser Hospital in the southern city of Khan Younis, where medical workers were striving to identify them.

Photos showed the remains, in white body bags, arranged in rows inside the grounds of Nasser Hospital. Health officials have struggled to identify bodies without access to DNA kits.

The handover brings the number of Palestinian bodies returned by Israel to 225, only 75 of which have been identified by families, according to Gaza's Health Ministry. It is unclear if those returned were killed in Israel during the Oct. 7, 2023, attack that triggered the war, died in Israeli custody as detainees or were recovered from Gaza by troops during the war.

The bodies returned had been “torn apart and exhumed,” Munir al-Bursh, director general of Gaza’s Health Ministry, said in a post on X.

“Their flesh had melted, their faces erased by fire, leaving behind only bones and teeth,” he said.

The Israeli military has previously told The Associated Press that all bodies returned so far are those of combatants, a claim the AP was unable to verify. The military has said it operates in accordance with international law.

Al-Bursh said recently that many of the bodies handed over appear to be fighters or others killed during the 2023 attack. Several relatives who have identified the bodies of family members said they weren’t fighters.

In Israel, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said late Thursday that the remains returned by Palestinian militants had been confirmed as those of Sahar Baruch and Amiram Cooper, both taken hostage during the 2023 attack.

Hamas has now returned the remains of 17 hostages since the start of the ceasefire, with 11 others still in Gaza and set to be turned over under the terms of the agreement.

On Friday a small crowd of Israelis gathered in the plaza known as Hostages Square, praying together for the return of the dead hostages still in Gaza.

“We cannot give up until everybody, all the bodies, will be here," said Rimona Velner, a Tel Aviv resident who joined the gathering. “It’s very important to the families and for us ... to close this circle.”

A senior U.S. official and a second source familiar with negotiations said that in messages passed to Hamas by mediators on Wednesday, Israel warned the militant group that its fighters had 24 hours to leave the yellow zone or face strikes.

That deadline passed Thursday evening, after which the senior U.S. official said “Israel will enforce the ceasefire and engage Hamas targets behind the yellow line.” Hamas did not respond to a request for comment.

On Friday, Shifa hospital director Mohamed Abu Selmiya said that one person had been killed by Israeli gunfire in northern Gaza. Israel's military said its troops had fired after the person approached troops in a way that posed a threat.

In a new assessment released Friday, the United Nations said satellite photos taken in early October show that 81 percent of all buildings in Gaza have been destroyed or otherwise damaged in the conflict.

Government officials from eight Arab and Muslim nations will gather in Istanbul on Monday to discuss the next steps for Gaza, Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan said Friday.

The talks follow a meeting between the countries' leaders and President Donald Trump on the sidelines of the United Nations Security Council, preceding the ceasefire agreement. They mark the latest effort to create an International Stabilization Force in Gaza, outlined in a 20-point U.S. plan.

The ceasefire, which began Oct. 10, is aimed at winding down a war that is by far the deadliest and most destructive of those ever fought between Israel and Hamas.

In the October 2023 attack on Israel, Hamas-led militants killed about 1,200 people and took 251 others hostage.

In the two years since, Israel’s military offensive has killed more than 68,600 Palestinians in Gaza, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, which doesn’t distinguish between civilians and combatants. The ministry, which is part of the Hamas-run government and is staffed by medical professionals, maintains detailed records viewed as generally reliable by independent experts.

Israel, which some international critics have accused of committing genocide in Gaza, has disputed the figures without providing its own tally.

In the central West Bank town of Silwad on Friday, mourners thronged the streets for the funeral of Yamen Hamed, 15, who Palestinian health officials say was shot by an Israeli soldier overnight. Samed Yousef Hamed kissed his son goodbye.

Samed said his son left home Thursday to hang out with friends. Soon after, he learned the teen had been injured and Israel's army was preventing an ambulance from reaching him. Ahed Smirat, the ambulance driver who tried to reach Hamed following the shooting, told the AP that troops held him up multiple times. By the time they let him through, troops told him the teen had died, he said.

Israel’s military called the teen a “terrorist” and said troops had fired believing that he was holding an explosive, but did not provide any evidence to support that characterization. Hamed's funeral was Friday.

The shooting is the latest in a surge of military killings of Palestinian children in the West Bank that has accompanied a general upswing in violence in the territory since the start of the Israel-Hamas war. Some were killed during Israeli military raids in dense neighborhoods, others by sniper fire in peaceful areas.

The killings have risen as the Israeli military has stepped up operations in the occupied West Bank since the war’s onset in what it calls a crackdown on militants.

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Frankel reported from Jerusalem. AP reporter Toqa Ezzidin in Cairo and AP Diplomatic Writer Matthew Lee in Washington contributed to this report.

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Find more of AP’s Israel-Hamas coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/israel-hamas-war