Red Cross team receives remains of Gaza hostages in handover
Bodies, borders and a bitter ceasefire: what the recent exchanges reveal about Gaza’s fragile pause
The exchange of bodies and a single identified Israeli remains a grim marker of a ceasefire that is at once fragile and consequential. Over recent days, Israeli forces and Hamas have overseen the handover of human remains in a transaction that follows the contours of a wider, uneasy truce — one that has temporarily halted the fiercest fighting but has not ended the humanitarian catastrophe or the political tectonics that produced it.
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Bodies as bargaining chips
On a recent day the International Committee of the Red Cross received two coffins of deceased hostages heading to Israeli security forces in Gaza, while Israeli authorities confirmed the identification of 75‑year‑old Eliyahu Margalit — killed at Kibbutz Nir Oz during the 7 October 2023 attack that set the war in motion. Margalit’s body was returned after being transferred by the Red Cross to Israeli teams for analysis. His family received the remains, Israeli officials said.
The exchanges are proceeding under a deal that, according to Israeli and Palestinian statements, calls for the transfer of 15 Palestinian bodies to Gaza for every deceased Israeli returned. Gaza’s health ministry said Israel handed back 15 Palestinian bodies this week, bringing the total returned to 135. Hamas has handed over all 20 surviving hostages and the remains of 10 of 28 known deceased, a pace that both sides portray as progress while also noting outstanding obligations.
“We will not compromise… and will spare no effort until we return all of the fallen abductees, down to the last one,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said after Margalit’s identification — a reminder that the issue of captives continues to shape political and military decisions on both sides.
Rafah and the limits of humanitarian relief
Even as bodies move under the auspices of humanitarian intermediaries, the Rafah crossing between Gaza and Egypt — the only prewar gateway not previously controlled by Israel — remains closed, Israeli officials said. Cairo had suggested a reopening, but Netanyahu’s office insisted Rafah would stay shut “until further notice.”
For Gaza’s two million residents, a functioning Rafah would mean faster access to medical care abroad, the movement of people to family in Egypt, and an alternative route for fuel, food and medicine. Relief agencies and the United Nations have repeatedly warned that keeping Rafah closed hampers the scale‑up of aid needed to prevent a deeper collapse of public health and sanitation.
According to figures released by the UN humanitarian office and the Israeli military’s civil affairs agency, some 950 trucks carrying aid and commercial goods entered Gaza from Israel on a recent day — a significant flow, but still a fraction of what would be required to restore basic services and support reconstruction.
On the ground: dignity amid ruins
Tom Fletcher, the UN’s relief coordinator, toured the ruins of Gaza and described seeing a “vast part of the city” turned into a wasteland. He spoke of returning residents digging latrines in the rubble and of a wastewater treatment plant reduced to a grim lake of sewage. “Most of all they want dignity,” he told reporters, summarising what many Gazans say they are yearning for after two years of bombardment and fighting.
Fletcher outlined a “massive 60‑day plan” aimed at surging food distribution, restoring some health services, bringing tents for winter and reopening schools. Yet the scale of destruction casts doubt on how quickly dignity can be restored. Reconstruction in densely populated urban areas hit by sustained bombardment is not only a technical task; it requires a durable political settlement, reliable funding, clear lines of security and the capacity to move heavy equipment and skilled labor into and out of the territory.
Relief efforts have been further complicated by episodes of violence despite the ceasefire. Gaza civil defence officials said nine members of a single family were killed when Israeli forces fired on a bus near the Zeitun neighbourhood; the military said its troops targeted a vehicle that crossed the so‑called “yellow line,” the boundary behind which Israeli forces are stationed under the ceasefire. Each incident underscores how precarious the pause remains.
Politics, optics and the next chapter
Domestically in Israel, the handling of the war, the hostages and the ceasefire have become animating issues ahead of elections. Netanyahu, who recently declared he would run again in November 2026, continues to present himself as committed to bringing home captives and protecting Israeli citizens — a posture that resonates with segments of the electorate but also draws sharp criticism from families of hostages who demand swifter, more comprehensive action.
For Hamas, maintaining the terms of the deal — and appearing to adhere to its obligations — serves both a strategic and propaganda purpose: it can claim it holds leverage that brings Israeli concessions while also projecting an image of discipline to its own supporters. Hamas spokesman Hazem Qassem said the group “continues to uphold its commitment to the ceasefire agreement” and would work to complete the prisoner exchange.
What this pause reveals about wider trends
- Urban warfare in densely populated areas leaves societies facing long, expensive, and politically fraught reconstruction processes, from sewage systems to schools.
- Humanitarian pauses and hostage exchanges often produce temporary relief but can entrench asymmetric bargaining that delays comprehensive settlements.
- Border control — particularly the status of crossings like Rafah — remains a strategic lever that can accelerate or impede aid and civilian movement, shaping the postconflict landscape.
As bodies are counted and crossings debated, civilians are the persistent, living ledger of the conflict: families who have lost kin, children out of school, and communities attempting to bury the dead and rebuild amid rubble. The current ceasefire offers a moment to press for more than temporary mitigation. Can international mediators translate the fragile mechanics of exchange into a durable framework for reconstruction and rights? Will reopening Rafah become a humanitarian imperative or a political battleground?
Two years after 7 October, the answers remain uncertain. What is clear is that the technical steps of returning bodies, moving aid convoys and patching broken infrastructure are only the first work of a much harder political task: creating conditions under which dignity, safety and normal life can return to people on both sides of the divide.
By Abdiwahab Ahmed
Axadle Times international–Monitoring.