Israel Returns 15 Palestinian Bodies to Gaza as Ceasefire Exchange’s First Phase Concludes

Israel on Thursday returned the bodies of 15 Palestinians to the Gaza Strip in a somber handover overseen by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC)—a transfer officials said completed the first phase of a U.S.-brokered ceasefire and exchange deal between Israel and Hamas.

The remains were delivered into Gaza and transported to Shifa Hospital in Gaza City, according to the Gaza Health Ministry, which said forensic teams would attempt to identify the dead so families could claim them for burial.

The transfer came days after Israeli authorities announced they had recovered and identified the body of Ran “Rani” Gvili, a 24-year-old police officer killed while fighting Hamas gunmen during the Oct. 7, 2023, attack on southern Israel. His remains were located in a cemetery in northern Gaza following what Israeli officials described as a large-scale operation that began Jan. 25.

Taken together, the recovery of Gvili’s body and the return of the 15 Palestinians mark the end of a months-long operation to exchange hostages, detainees and the dead under a ceasefire that has largely frozen front-line fighting in Gaza since October, even as sporadic violence has continued.

First phase deemed complete

In a statement Thursday, the ICRC said it had “facilitated the return of 15 deceased Palestinians to Gaza, after the remains of the final deceased hostage were recovered by Israeli authorities,” and called the sequence “the completion of release and transfer operations under the ceasefire agreement.”

Since those operations began in October, the Red Cross said it had helped transfer 20 living hostages, 1,808 detainees and the remains of 27 of 28 deceased Israeli hostages, along with 360 deceased Palestinians returned to Gaza.

“Ensuring that families can be reunited with their loved ones, whether alive or deceased, is a fundamental humanitarian imperative,” Julien Lerisson, the ICRC’s head of delegation in Israel and the occupied territories, said in remarks released this week. He urged all parties to “uphold international humanitarian law” as the agreement moves into its next stages.

Israeli officials did not immediately release details on the identities of the 15 Palestinians returned Thursday or the circumstances of their deaths. Palestinian authorities in Gaza and the West Bank say the remains are among those of Palestinians killed during the war whose bodies were taken or retained by Israel over the past two years.

The Gaza Health Ministry said the bodies were in varying states of decomposition and that visual identification would be challenging in many cases. In previous transfers, the ministry has posted censored photographs of remains online to help families recognize missing relatives in the absence of widespread DNA testing capacity.

A 15-for-1 formula

The Jan. 29 handover appears to fulfill a specific component of the October 2025 ceasefire: a ratio of 15 Palestinian bodies for each deceased Israeli hostage returned.

Under that framework—negotiated with heavy U.S. involvement and in force since Oct. 10—Israel agreed to release roughly 1,900 to 2,000 Palestinian prisoners, return hundreds of Palestinian remains and pull back forces from parts of Gaza, in exchange for the release of Israeli hostages and the remains of those killed in captivity or during the initial Hamas assault.

As of Thursday, no Israeli hostages—living or dead—are believed to remain in Gaza, according to Israeli officials and mediators. More than 190 hostages abducted on Oct. 7 have been returned alive through a combination of earlier short-term truces and the current deal, while others were confirmed killed.

For many Israelis, the recovery of Gvili’s body has been portrayed as closing a painful chapter that has dominated politics and public life since the 2023 attack, when Hamas-led militants killed about 1,200 people and seized 251 hostages, according to Israeli authorities.

Israel has long maintained that it will not leave any hostage behind, living or dead. The decision to wait for Gvili’s remains before completing the Palestinian body transfers allowed the government to argue that all obligations tied to the hostage file have now been discharged ahead of any further concessions under the ceasefire.

Palestinians seek closure amid uncertainty

For Palestinians in Gaza, the returns have brought both a measure of closure and new anguish. The Health Ministry says Israel has so far handed back 360 Palestinian bodies under the current ceasefire, but only around 100 have been identified and reburied by their families.

Rights advocates and Palestinian officials have for years criticized Israel’s practice of holding bodies of Palestinians killed in attacks or fighting as leverage in future negotiations. Israeli authorities say the policy is lawful and necessary to deter violence and enable future exchanges.

Some Palestinian groups and documentation projects allege that a number of returned bodies show signs of mistreatment, including bound hands or suspected desecration. Those claims could not be independently verified and are rejected by Israel, but they have gained traction in Palestinian public opinion, feeding anger over the conduct of the war and reinforcing calls for international investigations.

Lerisson and other Red Cross officials have repeatedly called on all sides to ensure the “dignified management of the deceased,” noting that the Geneva Conventions require parties to search for, collect and facilitate the proper burial of those killed in conflict and to provide information to their families.

Ceasefire on paper, fighting on the ground

Although officials refer to the October agreement as a ceasefire, the war has not fully stopped. According to the Gaza Health Ministry, at least 492 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza since the truce took effect, in incidents it attributes mainly to Israeli fire. Israel has accused Palestinian factions of multiple violations, including rocket launches and attacks on its forces near buffer zones.

International mediators, including the United States, Egypt and Qatar, have urged both sides to move quickly from what they describe as the first phase of the deal to subsequent stages focused on longer-term security arrangements and reconstruction.

The multi-stage plan envisions three broad phases: the current period of relative calm paired with exchanges of hostages, prisoners and bodies; a second phase involving the release of remaining living hostages, further Israeli withdrawals and steps toward a permanent cessation of hostilities; and a third phase centered on large-scale rebuilding of Gaza and the reopening of border crossings to regular trade and movement.

The ceasefire is closely tied to a wider U.S. proposal to reshape Gaza’s governance. That plan calls for the creation of a “Board of Peace,” an international oversight body backed by the United States and other partners, and a technocratic Palestinian administration made up of professionals and civil servants to manage day-to-day affairs in the strip.

Hamas, which has ruled Gaza since 2007, has publicly rejected any arrangement it sees as dismantling its armed wing or excluding it from political life. At the same time, some of its officials say they remain committed to implementing the ceasefire’s provisions and accuse Israel of stalling on troop withdrawals and aid access.

The Palestinian Authority, which governs parts of the occupied West Bank, has been largely sidelined in military terms but has positioned itself as a potential partner in any future civilian administration of Gaza, calling for full implementation of the ceasefire and an internationally backed reconstruction effort.

Next phase remains unsettled

Israel’s government, led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, faces competing pressures as talks shift from prisoner lists and body counts to security and sovereignty.

Netanyahu has vowed to prevent Hamas from rearming or regaining open control of Gaza and has resisted commitments to a full and permanent withdrawal before what he calls the “terror infrastructure” is dismantled. Far-right members of his coalition oppose any arrangement they view as limiting Israeli security control in the territory or empowering rival Palestinian factions.

Aid organizations and some Western officials argue that without rapid progress on reopening crossings, increasing aid deliveries and establishing a credible security and governance framework, the fragile calm could erode, repeating a pattern seen when an earlier ceasefire framework faltered in early 2025.

The Rafah crossing between Gaza and Egypt, a key gateway for people and goods, has remained largely closed since May 2024. Officials say it could partially reopen in the coming weeks for medical evacuations under new security arrangements, but there is no agreement yet on broader trade or travel.

For now, Thursday’s body transfer stands as a stark marker: the accounting of hostages, prisoners and many of the dead has, for the moment, run its course. What remains to be decided—who will wield power in Gaza, how security will be enforced and how the strip will be rebuilt—is likely to prove far more difficult than the grim arithmetic of the first phase.