The first phase of the Gaza peace agreement Donald Trump it staggers. This Tuesday there were the first violations of the fragile ceasefire that Israel and Hamas ratified last week in the Egyptian city of Sharm el-Sheikh and that the parties began to comply with this Monday, with the exchange of the last 20 living Israeli hostages for the almost 2,000 Palestinian prisoners.
Israel will keep the Rafah crossing, the main humanitarian corridor in the Strip, closed until further notice. A border crossing that, according to the content of the agreement, the Israeli authorities had to enable in the coming days. The much-needed humanitarian aid will not enter the punished Palestinian enclave through this route.
The Government of Benjamin Netanyahu He also informed the UN that, starting this Wednesday, he will only allow 300 trucks of humanitarian aid to enter Gaza. It is half of the agreed number. The Israeli authorities will also not authorize the entry of gas or fuel into the Strip. It will only make rare exceptions, according to the agency. Reuters.
Israel says the decision responds to Hamas’s delay in handing over the hostages. The Minister of Public Security, Itamar Ben Trueproposes even going further. “I call on the prime minister to set a clear ultimatum for Hamas: if you do not immediately return all the bodies of our fallen soldiers and continue these delays, we will immediately stop all aid entering the Gaza Strip,” the anti-Arab supremacist leader wrote on his Telegram channel.
The ceasefire agreement contemplated that Hamas had to hand over the bodies of the 28 hostages who died in the first 72 hours from the entry into force of the agreement. That is, this Monday. And this Monday, Hamas only confirmed having transferred four.
The Palestinian Islamist group identified the victims as Guy Ilouz, Bipin Joshi, Yossi Sharabi y Daniel Peretz. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF), which completed the identification process on Tuesday, however, consider that Hamas has not made sufficient efforts to locate the remaining 24 hostages who remain in Gaza.
According to the newspaper Haaretzthe Israeli military is convinced that Hamas knows the whereabouts of many of the kidnapped people who have died, and not just the first four it handed over this Tuesday. The Forum of Families of Hostages and Missing Persons shares the diagnosis.
“Only four deceased hostages return today. Only four families will be able to give them a decent burial and begin to close the mourning. How is it possible to accept that the others are still there? What we feared is happening before our eyes,” begins the letter that the relatives of the kidnapped people sent to Steve WitkoffTrump’s special envoy.
In the letter, the victims’ relatives ask the New York real estate investor, applauded this Monday in the Knesset during the White House tenant’s speech, “to do everything possible and leave no stone unturned to demand that Hamas fulfill its part of the agreement and return all the remaining hostages home.”
Hamas had warned Israel through mediators in Sharm el-Sheikh that it would take several days or weeks to find the bodies of those kidnapped. This Tuesday, in fact, the International Committee of the Red Cross agreed that it will take time to face the “enormous challenge” of returning the mortal remains.
Many were buried in the rubble of Gaza. “It is an even greater challenge than releasing people alive,” declared the spokesperson for the humanitarian organization in this sense. Christian Cardon. Several Egyptian teams are participating in the search efforts, according to the Qatari television network. Al Araby.
Faced with threats from the Israeli authorities to significantly cut humanitarian assistance, Hamas delivered the remains of four other deceased hostages late Tuesday night, as confirmed by the International Committee of the Red Cross.
The disarmament of Hamas
Trump also denounced Hamas’s slowness in the process of returning the hostages, but announced that this Tuesday “the second phase” of the ceasefire agreement would begin. “THE DEAD HAVE NOT BEEN RETURNED, AS PROMISED! Phase Two begins RIGHT NOW!” the US president wrote (sic) on his Truth Social platform.
But the images of the areas of Gaza from which Israeli troops have withdrawn do not support the prospects for peace either. Regrouped, Hamas militants try to regain control at gunpoint.
According to Reutersdozens of Gazans have died in recent days in clashes between Hamas fighters and rival clans. Among the fatalities is the renowned Palestinian journalist Saleh Aljafarawilinked to Hamas, killed in strange circumstances. The Islamist movement says it will go after Israel collaborators, armed looters and drug traffickers.
Trump, however, claimed to have given his approval to the Palestinian militia’s efforts to impose its law in areas of the enclave not occupied by Israeli forces. At least temporarily. And Netanyahu had insisted that the war “cannot end as long as Hamas retains its weapons and control of Gaza.”
The president of the United States recalled, in any case, that Hamas was obliged to hand over its weapons. Although he did not specify when. “They are going to disarm, because they said they would. And if they don’t, we will disarm them,” he threatened this Tuesday from the White House in front of his Argentine counterpart. Javier Milei. “They know I’m not playing.”