As part of the efforts to recover the remaining 13 slain hostages held in Gaza, an Egyptian team has entered the Strip with several engineering vehicles to assist with locating their bodies, an Israeli defense official said Saturday.
The move was personally approved by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, his office told The Times of Israel.
“It is a technical team,” the PMO said. “They are going in only to locate the slain hostages.”
Information from both Israel and Hamas on the location of dead hostages has been given to the Egyptian team to guide their search, Channel 12 reported Saturday.
Until now, Israel had not approved the entry of such teams, claiming that Hamas was capable of finding and returning the bodies itself.
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According to Channel 12, Israel knows for certain that Hamas can hand over more bodies of slain hostages but is deciding not to, and is also holding back information about their location.
A photograph shows tents at a makeshift displacement camp in the al-Mawasi area of Khan Younis, in the southern Gaza Strip, on October 25, 2025. (BASHAR TALEB / AFP)
Security officials told the families of slain hostages the general area where the bodies of their loved ones are being held.
Israeli sources told the outlet that they expect Hamas to return two more bodies on Sunday after pressure from mediators, who told the terror group that US President Donald Trump is close to declaring that Hamas is responsible for the collapse of the ceasefire.
According to the network, Israel considered holding up the entry of fuel and food into Gaza in order to pressure Hamas, but senior Trump administration officials who were in Israel over the past week shot down the idea, arguing it could endanger the ceasefire. The Prime Minister’s Office denied this report.
The report on possible sanctions on Hamas came after the Kan public broadcaster reported that Israeli defense officials told US Vice President JD Vance during a meeting Thursday that Hamas could return the bodies of at least 10 of the 13 deceased hostages still held in Gaza.
Members of the Hamas terrorist group search underground for the bodies of Israeli hostages amid destroyed buildings in Khan Younis, in the southern Gaza Strip, October 19, 2025. (AP Photo/Abdel Kareem Hana)
According to the Kan report, top Israeli officials presented Vance with the IDF’s intelligence assessment of Gaza and “stated unequivocally” that Hamas is capable of returning at least 10 of the 13 remaining hostages, even before international teams entered the Strip to assist with recovering the bodies.
It has been previously reported that Hamas might not be able to find all the dead hostages, something that Israel is aware of.
According to one Israeli official cited by CNN earlier this month, seven to nine bodies might not be retrieved, while another put that figure at between 10 and 15.
Before the ceasefire, Hamas was holding the bodies of 28 dead hostages. It has since returned 15 of them, along with releasing 20 surviving captives. The most recent transfer of the remains of two slain captives took place on Tuesday night.
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