Copyright © HT Digital Streams Limited All rights reserved. Mourners at a funeral for Inbar Hayman. REUTERS/Hannah McKay (REUTERS) Summary The unexpected dispute over Hamas’ return of dead hostages to Israel highlights the fragility of the deal. TEL AVIV—At the start of the week, President Trump declared the “historic dawn of a new Middle East” after securing a cease-fire between Israel and Hamas that ended the war in Gaza. Days later, the peace process is already stumbling. The reason: a controversy over Hamas’s failure to return all the bodies of dead hostages remaining in Gaza. Israel and the Arab mediators in the talks knew Hamas could not locate all of them, but the militant group’s initial decision to return just four looked like foot-dragging to Israel and sparked a highly political skirmish amid demands that the deal be halted until the bodies are returned. While not itself expected to derail Trump’s plan, the dispute over an issue not expected to derail underscores the fragility of a high-stakes deal forged by using the president’s unconventional diplomatic strategy of declaring success with broad goals and then leaving it to the parties to work out the details. Even thornier issues lie ahead, including the composition of the Arab-led force supposed to secure Gaza, how much of a commitment will be made to a path to a Palestinian state, and the disarmament of Hamas, the US-designated terror group that controls the enclave. View Full Image Workers prepared to clear debris in Gaza City this week. Before moving deeper into formal talks to resolve those issues, Israel and Hamas must first move past the initial phase of the deal they agreed to last week — which was supposed to be the easy part. Under that agreement, Hamas would hand over all 48 remaining hostages—living and dead—in exchange for Israel’s release of nearly 2,000 Palestinian prisoners and a phased withdrawal of its troops. Twenty live hostages returned to Israel on Monday, but Hamas was slow to deliver the remains of 28 others. Negotiators knew from the outset that recovering the bodies would be difficult amid the rubble of war-torn Gaza, but Israeli officials say Hamas is deliberately delaying to preserve what little leverage it has left. “We know for a fact they can easily bring a significant number of dead hostages and return them,” Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar said on Thursday. “So what they’re doing now, it’s a fundamental breach of the agreement.” On Thursday, Hamas reiterated its support for Trump’s deal and said finding the bodies would take some time. “Hamas confirms its commitment to the agreement and its zeal to implement it, including the delivery of all remaining bodies,” it said, blaming Israel for obstructing the task by halting efforts to send in recovery teams. View full image Hamas members monitored Red Cross vehicles collecting hostage remains. In its initial handover on Monday, Hamas returned four bodies, fewer than Israel had expected and deeply disappointing to the families awaiting their return. Six more bodies have since been handed over, after Israel said it would curb the flow of humanitarian aid in response to what it sees as Hamas’ violation of the treaty. One of the bodies was determined by forensic analysis not to be that of a hostage, bringing the total number of bodies returned to nine. Hamas told mediators that recovering the bodies from the rubble of Gaza could take weeks and require special equipment that is currently not allowed to enter the war-torn enclave, such as bulldozers and excavators. Recognizing the challenge, Israel and mediating countries have formed an international task force that includes Egypt and Turkey to help recover the remains. Still, Israeli officials believe Hamas is holding out for bodies they can recover more quickly. Arab officials said Israel told mediators on Wednesday it believed Hamas knew the location of at least six others. “Hamas seems to be stretching the terms on the return of the bodies, playing on the edge of what was agreed,” said Avisay Ben Sasson-Gordis, a senior researcher at the Tel Aviv-based Institute for National Security Studies. However, he said, “it is unlikely at the moment that it will derail the ceasefire and push us back into war.” View full image Trucks carry aid in Khan Younis, in the southern Gaza Strip. If mediators can push past the dispute over the bodies, they have a host of even more complex issues to work out. Technical teams from Israel and Hamas this week began preliminary negotiations for the second phase of the plan, but it is unclear when or where formal talks will be held. Meanwhile, conditions on the ground in Gaza are changing rapidly, with Hamas already reasserting its authority in areas where Israeli troops have withdrawn. It deployed thousands of armed men to patrol the streets, often dressed in civilian clothes. The group launched a violent crackdown on rival militias and publicly executed several members of a powerful Palestinian family in Gaza City. After initially telling reporters that Hamas had been given “authorization for a period” to secure Gaza until an international security force stepped in, Trump changed his tone as the violence escalated. “If Hamas continues to kill people in Gaza, which was not the Deal, we will have no choice but to go in and kill them,” Trump said on social media on Thursday. Write to Summer Said at summer.said@wsj.com and Feliz Solomon at feliz.solomon@wsj.com Get all the political news and updates on Live Mint. Download the Mint News app to get daily market updates and live business news. more topics #Israel Read next story
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