Staff members from Egyptian Red Crescent stand near a truck carrying humanitarian aid as it enters Gaza from the Egyptian side of the Rafah border crossing on Oct 12, 2025. (PHOTO / XINHUA)

JERUSALEM/GAZA – Israel decided on Tuesday to halt the reopening of the Rafah crossing and further reduce humanitarian aid to Gaza, as both sides traded accusations of violating the fragile ceasefire.

The crossing, a key route for aid from Egypt to Gaza, had been scheduled to reopen today.

An Israeli government official, speaking to Xinhua on condition of anonymity, said the Rafah crossing will remain closed and the entry of humanitarian aid will be “drastically” limited until Hamas returns all the bodies of the deceased hostages.

The official described the measures as “sanctions against Hamas” following the group’s handover of four bodies on Monday, with 24 remaining in Gaza.

There has been no official announcement of the restrictions from the Prime Minister’s office or the security establishment.

London-based Al Araby TV reported that Egyptian teams have begun working in the Gaza Strip to help locate and recover the bodies of Israeli hostages. According to the report, an Israeli technical team is holding consultations with Egyptian officials to coordinate the recovery of the remains of the Israeli captives.

Hamas spokesman Hazem Qassem told Xinhua that the technical and logistical challenges resulting from the massive destruction pose serious obstacles to the identification and recovery of the bodies. The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has stated that the teams may not be able to find some bodies.

Israel was angered by the limited handover of four bodies, noting that under the ceasefire agreement, Hamas was required to return all 28 bodies held in Gaza by Monday. However, the group informed the mediators that it was facing difficulties locating the burial sites of all of the bodies.

The return of the bodies came after the transfer of the last 20 surviving hostages from Gaza to Israel and the release of about 2,000 Palestinian detainees and prisoners, marking a key phase in the Israel-Hamas ceasefire deal.

The two sides have traded accusations of violating the ceasefire, now in its fifth day, over Hamas’s failure to hand over all the missing bodies and Israeli fire that killed at least six people in Gaza on Tuesday.  

Meanwhile, four more bodies of hostages were in the custody of Israeli forces in Gaza after Hamas handed them over to the ICRC on Tuesday night, the Israeli military and the Shin Bet security agency said in a joint statement.

Israel handed over the remains of 45 Palestinians

Also on Tuesday, Israel handed over the remains of 45 Palestinians to the ICRC, which later transferred them to local authorities in the Gaza Strip as part of the ongoing prisoner exchange deal, medical sources said.

A Gaza-based health official told Xinhua that medical teams at Nasser Medical Complex in Khan Younis received the remains through the Kerem Shalom crossing. “Work is underway to identify the bodies through DNA testing before handing them over to their families,” the official said.

In a brief statement, the ICRC confirmed that it supervised the handover process based on an agreement between the parties and in coordination with the relevant authorities, stressing that the operation was conducted in accordance with humanitarian standards applicable in such cases.

The handover came a day after Hamas released 20 Israeli captives alive and four of the 28 bodies held in Gaza under a ceasefire and prisoner exchange deal mediated by the United States, Egypt, Qatar, and Türkiye following two years of war.

In return, Israel released 1,968 Palestinian prisoners and detainees from its jails, including 1,718 arrested after the start of the war in Gaza on Oct 7, 2023, according to data from Hamas’ Prisoner Media Office and Palestinian organizations.