Israel hands over 15 Palestinian bodies as hostage-remains exchange continues under fragile ceasefire

Ceasefire strained by escalating tensions

Israel returned the bodies of 15 Palestinians to Gaza on Friday, officials at Nasser hospital in Khan Younis said, in the latest step to fulfilling the terms of the fragile U.S.-brokered ceasefire agreement.

The bodies were returned after militants late Thursday handed over the body of one of the last four remaining Israeli hostages taken during the Oct. 7, 2023, attack that launched the war in Gaza.

Israel identified the returned body as that of Meny Godard, who was abducted from Kibbutz Be’eri in southern Israel. His wife, Ayelet, was killed during the attack.

The armed wings of Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad said Godard’s body was recovered in southern Gaza.

The remains of 25 hostages have been returned to Israel since the ceasefire between Israel and Hamas began on Oct. 10. There are still three more in Gaza that need to be recovered and handed over. Hamas returned 20 living hostages to Israel on Oct. 13.

For each hostage returned, Israel has released the remains of 15 Palestinians, an exchange central to the ceasefire’s first phase. Overall, the number of bodies of Palestinians received so far is 330, of which only 95 have been formally identified, according to Gaza Health Ministry officials.

Health officials in Gaza have said identifying the remains handed over by Israel is complicated by a lack of DNA testing kits.

The exchanges have gone ahead even as Israel and Hamas have accused each other of violating other terms of the deal. Israel has accused Hamas of handing over partial remains in some instances and staging the discovery of bodies in others, while Hamas has accused Israel of opening fire at civilians and restricting the flow of humanitarian aid into the territory.

The UN's human rights chief Volker Türk on Friday joined a chorus of condemnation over a recent string of attacks by Israeli settlers against Palestinians in the West Bank, urging an end to the violence and for Israel to hold the perpetrators accountable.

UN Human Rights Commissioner spokesperson Thameen Al-Kheetan said Türk also called on Israel to end its “unlawful presence in the occupied Palestinian territory," immediately stop all new settlement activities and to evacuate all settlers.

Al-Kheetan said more than 206 attacks by Israeli settlers against Palestinians were recorded in October, more than in any month since 2006.

“We reiterate that the Israeli government’s assertion of sovereignty over the occupied West Bank and its annexation of parts of it are in breach of international law, as the International Court of Justice has confirmed,” said Al-Kheetan.

Israeli settlers on Thursday torched and defaced a mosque in a Palestinian village in the central West Bank. That followed violence two days earlier during which dozens of masked Israeli settlers set fire to vehicles and other property in the Palestinian villages of Beit Lid and Deir Sharaf.

The attacks on the two Palestinian villages prompted Israeli President Isaac Herzog to denounce them as “shocking and serious.” Israeli army’s chief of staff, Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir said the military “will not tolerate the phenomena of a minority of criminals who tarnish a law-abiding public.”

U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Wednesday that there's concern that the events in the West Bank "could undermine what we’re doing in Gaza.”

Israeli officials have sought to cast settler violence as the work of a few extremists. But Palestinians and rights groups say that the violence is widespread and carried out by settlers across the territory, with impunity from Israel’s far-right government, led by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who hasn’t commented on the surge in violence.

The next parts of the 20-point plan call for creating an international stabilization force, forming a technocratic Palestinian government and disarming Hamas.

The fragile agreement aims to wind down the war that was triggered by the Hamas-led attack on southern Israel that killed about 1,200 people and saw 251 taken hostage.

Israel responded with a sweeping military offensive that has killed more than 69,100 Palestinians in Gaza, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry. The ministry, part of the Hamas-run government and staffed by medical professionals, maintains detailed records viewed as generally reliable by independent experts.