Netanyahu says bodies of hostages received as Trump reportedly says fighting could resume if Hamas fails to uphold agreement – as it happened

Benjamin Netanyahu has confirmed that the Israeli military has received the bodies of two hostages, which were earlier been handed over to the Red Cross by Hamas in Gaza. The remains will be taken to a specialist centre in Israel for formal identification. “All the families of the hostages have been updated on the matter, and in this difficult hour, our hearts are with them,” the Israeli PM said. “The effort to bring back our hostages continues relentlessly and will not stop until the last hostage is returned.” Donald Trump said he would consider allowing Benjamin Netanyahu to resume military action in Gaza if Hamas refuses to uphold its end of the ceasefire deal, telling CNN that Israeli forces could return to the streets “as soon as I say the word”. “What’s going on with Hamas - that’ll be straightened out quickly,” the US president said in a telephone call. Asked what happens if Hamas refuses to disarm, Trump said he’d “think about it”. “Israel will return to those streets as soon as I say the word,” he said. “If Israel could go in and knock the crap of them, they’d do that.” He added of the IDF and the Netanyahu administration: “I had to hold them back. I had it out with Bibi.” It comes as Hamas handed over the bodies of another two hostages on Wednesday night but the ceasefire remains fragile amid amid growing tensions over the perceived slow return of the bodies still inside Gaza. The Red Cross confirmed receipt of the two coffins, and the IDF and Hamas both separately confirmed the transfer had taken place. It followed the return of three bodies to Israel by Hamas overnight. They were named as Uriel Baruch, Tamir Nimrodi and Eitan Levi - but Israel said a fourth body was not one of the hostages. Their funerals are being held in Israel. With that, Hamas said it had handed over all the remains it was able to reach, and said it would need extensive efforts and special equipment to find and recover the remaining bodies among the ruins of Gaza. Per the ceasefire agreement, the deadline for all the living and dead hostages to be handed over expired on Monday. Hamas had previously indicated that locating some of the remains would be difficult and take longer as not all burial sites are known, locating and accessing them is difficult amid the sea of rubble, and some bodies may be in areas it no longer controls. The Red Cross has also said the task represents a “massive challenge” that could take days or weeks - and that there was a possibility some may never be found. US vice-president JD Vance also acknowledged on Sunday that the difficulties meant some of the bodies might never be recovered. On that, Israel has reportedly shared intelligence with the US claiming that Hamas has access to more bodies than it claims. Citing two Israeli officials and one US official, Axios reported that Israel told the US Hamas was not doing enough to recover the bodies of the remaining dead Israeli hostages, and that the Gaza deal cannot move into the next phase until that changes. Per Axios’s report: “Both Israeli and US officials close to the process are concerned that elements within the Netanyahu government - particularly ultranationalist ministers Betzalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben Gvir - will use the issue of hostage remains to undermine the deal (which they oppose) and push for the resumption of the war.” “Hamas will give all the bodies back, but it is going to take time. We will continue working on it but we can’t allow the deal to collapse,” a US official told Axios. But Israel’s defense minister Israel Katz has instructed the military to prepare a comprehensive plan to “defeat Hamas” in Gaza if the war is renewed, a statement from his office read. The plan would apply if Hamas “refuses to implement President Trump’s plan, and it becomes necessary to resume fighting”, according to the statement. Indeed, the Israeli government earlier said there would be no compromises on the return of dead hostages, and would “spare no effort until our fallen hostages return”. It has threatened to halt the opening of the Rafah crossing on Thursday to continue to restrict desperately needed humanitarian aid entering Gaza, actions which have been criticised as “outrageous” by aid agencies. As trucks loaded up with aid lined up on the Egyptian side on Wednesday, the key crossing remained closed. Aid agencies warned the humanitarian situation on the ground remains at crisis point despite being days into the ceasefire. Unicef said it is still waiting for aid deliveries to surge and Tom Fletcher, the United Nations under-secretary-general for humanitarian affairs and its top emergency relief coordinator, told AFP that what had entered so far was just “a fraction of what’’s needed”. He told Reuters that thousands of humanitarian vehicles must enter weekly to avert further catastrophe. “We have 190,000 metric tons of provisions on the borders waiting to go in and we’re determined to deliver. That’s essential life-saving food and nutrition,” he said. Israel returned the bodies of 45 Palestinians and work to identify them is underway in Gaza. It takes the total to 90 so far. The BBC reported that footage filmed at Nasser hospital’s mortuary appeared to show the body of a blindfolded man, while another body appeared to have marks around the wrists and ankles. Israel has previously rejected accusations of widespread ill-treatment and torture of detainees A senior US military leader called on Hamas to stop violence against civilians and to “disarm without delay”, as the militant group reasserts itself by deploying security forces and executing those it deems collaborators with Israel. It represents slightly mixed messaging from the US after Donald Trump appeared to give Hamas the green light to temporarily police Gaza. He told reporters on Tuesday that Hamas had killed “a number of gang members” which he said did not bother him. On Wednesday Trump admitted that it could be innocent civilians too, saying “it could be gangs plus”. The US military will not be needed to disarm Hamas militants, Donald Trump has just told reporters in the Oval Office, adding that the US would support Israel in the effort. He reiterated that the US wants Hamas to give up their weapons as part of the Gaza deal reached last week. Israel has shared intelligence with the US claiming that Hamas has access to more bodies than it claims, Axios is reporting. Citing two Israeli officials and one US official, Axios reports that Israel told the US Hamas was not doing enough to recover the bodies of the remaining dead Israeli hostages, and that the Gaza deal cannot move into the next phase until that changes. Per Axios’s report: “Both Israeli and US officials close to the process are concerned that elements within the Netanyahu government - particularly ultranationalist ministers Betzalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben Gvir - will use the issue of hostage remains to undermine the deal (which they oppose) and push for the resumption of the war.” “Hamas will give all the bodies back, but it is going to take time. We will continue working on it but we can’t allow the deal to collapse,” a US official told the outlet. Earlier, we reported that Hamas had said it had now passed on all the bodies it could reach, and needs extra equipment to return the remaining deceased hostages. Benjamin Netanyahu has confirmed that the Israeli military has received the bodies of two hostages, which were earlier been handed over to the Red Cross by Hamas in Gaza. The remains will be taken to a specialist centre in Israel for formal identification. “All the families of the hostages have been updated on the matter, and in this difficult hour, our hearts are with them,” the Israeli PM said. “The effort to bring back our hostages continues relentlessly and will not stop until the last hostage is returned.” Israel’s defense minister Israel Katz has instructed the military to prepare a comprehensive plan to “defeat Hamas” in Gaza if the war is renewed, a statement from his office read. Katz made the order today during a meeting with military leaders. The plan would apply if Hamas “refuses to implement President Trump’s plan, and it becomes necessary to resume fighting”, according to the statement. It goes on: Under Trump’s plan, Hamas must return all the fallen hostages in its possession, and disarm, while Israel, together with the international force led by the US, will act to destroy all tunnels and terror infrastructure in Gaza to ensure that Gaza is demilitarized [and does not pose] any threat to the State of Israel. Israel would otherwise resume the fighting, which it has to pause under the ceasefire agreement currently in place, it said. The Red Cross has received two coffins with deceased hostages, the Israeli military has confirmed. The coffins are on their way to IDF and ISA forces in Gaza. In a separate statement, Hamas’ military wing confirmed it had handed over the bodies of two Israeli hostages to the Red Cross in Gaza City. In that call with CNN, Trump repeated his view that Hamas is “going in and clearing out the gangs, violent gangs” in Gaza. “I’m doing research on it,” he said when asked if it were possible that Hamas was executing innocent Palestinians. “We’ll find out about it. It could be gangs plus,” he said. Donald Trump has told CNN he would consider allowing Benjamin Netanyahu to resume military action in Gaza if Hamas refuses to uphold its end of the ceasefire deal, saying Israeli forces could return to the streets “as soon as I say the word”. “What’s going on with Hamas - that’ll be straightened out quickly,” the US president said in a telephone call. Asked what happens if Hamas refuses to disarm, Trump said he’d “think about it”. “Israel will return to those streets as soon as I say the word,” he said. “If Israel could go in and knock the crap of them, they’d do that.” “I had to hold them back,” he said of the IDF and the Netanyahu administration. “I had it out with Bibi.” Hamas’ armed wing has said it has returned all the bodies of deceased hostages it was able to recover so far, and that the remaining bodies will require extensive efforts and special equipment to find and recover from the ruins of Gaza. The group said it was committed to what was agreed upon in the ceasefire deal and said it was “exerting great effort” to close the file. In a statement on social media, it said: The Resistance has fulfilled its commitment to the agreement by handing over all living Israeli prisoners in its custody, as well as the corpses it could access. As for the remaining corpses, it requires extensive efforts and special equipment for their retrieval and extraction. We are exerting great effort in order to close this file. The Israeli military has said the Red Cross is on its way to Gaza to receive the bodies of “several” dead hostages. It did not provide a breakdown on the number of hostages the Red Cross is set to receive but Hamas earlier said it would hand over two bodies. AFP has the statement from the Ezzedine Al-Qassam Brigades. It says that as part of the hostage-prisoner exchange, “the Al-Qassam Brigades have decided to hand over the bodies of two occupation prisoners in the Gaza Strip at 10pm” local time. Further to my last post, Hamas’ armed wing has said it has decided to hand over the bodies of two deceased hostages in Gaza at 10pm local time tonight, Reuters is reporting. I’ll bring you more on this as we get it. Four to five deceased hostages are expected to be returned to Israel from Gaza this evening, a source familiar with the matter has told CNN. Under the ceasefire agreement, Hamas was supposed to return all of the living and deceased hostages within the first 72 hours, though the group has indicated that locating some of the remains amid the rubble of Gaza will take longer. So far, seven of the remaining 28 deceased hostages have been returned (the number was eight but Israel has since said one of the bodies was not one of the hostages). The United Nations is seeking a dramatic boost in humanitarian aid for Gaza, saying the hundreds of relief trucks cleared to enter the devastated enclave under a ceasefire were nowhere near the thousands needed to ease a humanitarian disaster. Tom Fletcher, the United Nations Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs and its top emergency relief coordinator, told Reuters in an interview that thousands of humanitarian vehicles must enter weekly to avert further catastrophe. “We have 190,000 metric tons of provisions on the borders waiting to go in and we’re determined to deliver. That’s essential life-saving food and nutrition,” Fletcher said. Israel’s two-year air and ground war against Palestinian militant group Hamas drove almost all Gaza’s 2.2 million people from their homes, and famine is present in the north, global monitors say. Trucks carrying food aid and fuel, accompanied by a United Nations team, passed through the Kerem Shalom border crossing and arrive in the city of Khan Yunis, Gaza, earlier today. Dozens of soldiers and civilians have been killed after fresh clashes broke out along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border and Islamabad carried out retaliatory airstrikes on the Afghan capital, Kabul, and Kandahar province. The two sides declared a ceasefire by Wednesday night after the latest outbreak of violence, which came after the deadliest cross-border clashes in years over the weekend. Both countries accused the other of sparking the violence. Pakistan’s military said the Afghan Taliban had carried out “unprovoked fire” on major border posts close to the Kurram district and the crossing between the Chaman and Spin Boldak districts on Tuesday evening. It said it had retaliated with mortar fire and drone strikes, killing 20 Taliban fighters. Pakistani security sources confirmed that the air force had also carried out strikes on headquarters of Taliban forces in Kandahar province, where the cross-firing reportedly began, and on targets in Kabul. Images showed the “friendship gate” at the Chaman-Spin Boldak crossing had sustained significant damage in the attacks, and it remained closed for the day. Hundreds of people fled Pakistani border villages overnight and local residents reported cross-border firing, strikes and drone deployment that lasted into the evening. In Kandahar province, residents said many people along the border areas had also been fleeing. The Syrian president, Ahmed al-Sharaa, travelled to Moscow on Wednesday for talks with Vladimir Putin, marking their first meeting since the fall of the Kremlin ally Bashar al-Assad and his subsequent exile in Russia. The talks underscored Moscow’s efforts to safeguard its military foothold in Syria and forge relations with the new rulers in Damascus, with both sides taking a pragmatic approach despite having been enemies only a year ago. The meeting is notable given that Sharaa, a former jihadist, led the successful rebellion against the Moscow-backed Assad regime last year, in which his rebel forces briefly came under fire from Russian jets before Moscow withdrew its support for the Assad family. Speaking in the Kremlin, Sharaa said his government respected all previously signed agreements between Damascus and Moscow, indicating that Russia would be allowed to retain its military bases in Syria, though the exact scale of their presence remains unclear. Sharaa’s visit comes after Moscow was forced to postpone a long-planned summit with Arab leaders after a series of cancellations by regional heavyweights preoccupied with Gaza peace talks. In his remarks, Putin said Russia had “always based its relations with Syria on the interests of the Syrian people”, adding that the relationship “has always been exclusively friendly”. A top US military official in the Middle East has urged Hamas “to stop shooting Palestinian civilians”. This came after reports that the group’s fighters clashed with armed parties and killed alleged gangsters in what it described as an effort to restore law and order. “We strongly urge Hamas to immediately suspend violence and shooting innocent Palestinian civilians in Gaza — in both Hamas-held parts of Gaza and those secured by the IDF behind the Yellow Line,” said Admiral Brad Cooper of the United States Central Command, referring to the initial ceasefire line dividing zones of control in Gaza. He used an acronym of the Israeli military. The call came a day after president Donald Trump said the clashes left him unbothered and did not affect the agreement that could pave the way for Hamas’ disarmament.