Israel receives remains of hostage Hamas says is Israeli soldier killed in 2014

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Israel has received the body of a hostage that Hamas says is the remains of an Israeli soldier who was killed in Gaza in 2014 and who had been held in the territory since then.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office confirmed that Israel had received the coffin carrying the remains of a fallen hostage from the Red Cross. It was handed over to the military and operatives of Israel's Shin Bet domestic intelligence agency inside the Gaza Strip. The remains would then be taken to Israel's National Center for Forensic Medicine for identification, his office said.

"All the families of the fallen hostages have been informed, and our hearts go out to them at this difficult time," Netanyahu's office said in a statement. "The effort to return our hostages continues continuously and will not stop until the last hostage is returned."

Hamas said that it found the body of the soldier, Hadar Goldin, in a tunnel in the enclave's southernmost city of Rafah on Saturday. Goldin was killed on Aug. 1, 2014, two hours after a ceasefire ended that year's war between Israel and Hamas.

The return of his remains would be a significant development in the U.S.-brokered truce, which many fear has been faltering amidst the slow return of bodies of hostages and skirmishes between Israeli troops and militants in Gaza. It would also close a painful, 11-year saga for his family and in Israel, where Goldin has become a national symbol.

If the body is identified as Goldin's, there will be four bodies of hostages remaining in Gaza.

At the start of the weekly Cabinet meeting, Netanyahu said that holding the body for so long has caused "great agony of his family, which will now be able to give him a Jewish burial."

Goldin's family spearheaded a very public campaign, along with the family of another soldier whose body was taken in 2014, to bring their sons home for burial. Israel recovered the remains of the other soldier, Oron Shaul, earlier this year.

Netanyahu said that the government would continue trying to bring home the bodies of other Israelis killed while serving the country, including Eli Cohen, an Israeli spy hanged in Damascus in 1965, whose exploits were celebrated in 'The Spy', a 2019 television series.

Israeli media, citing anonymous officials, had previously reported that Hamas was delaying the release of Goldin's body in hopes of negotiating safe passage for more than 100 militants surrounded by Israeli forces and trapped in the enclave's southernmost city of Rafah.

Gila Gamliel, the minister of innovation, science and technology and a member of Netanyahu's Likud party, told Army Radio that Israel isn't negotiating for a deal within a deal.

"There are agreements whose implementation is guaranteed by the mediators, and we shouldn't allow anyone to come now and play (games) and to reopen the agreement," she said.

Hamas did not comment on a possible exchange for its fighters stuck in the so-called yellow zone, which is controlled by Israeli forces, though they acknowledged that there are clashes taking place there.

American-Israeli soldier laid to rest

The funeral for Staff Sgt. Itay Chen, an American-Israeli soldier who was killed during Hamas' terrorist attack on Oct. 7, 2023, and whose body was returned last week, was held Sunday in Tel Aviv.

Chen, 19, of the 77th Battalion of the 7th Brigade, was abducted by Hamas after falling from a tank and his death was officially confirmed on March 10, 2024.

Hundreds gathered for his funeral at Kiryat Shaul Cemetery in Tel Aviv on Sunday.

"I did not know Itay in body, but I came to know him through the strength of those who loved him. His family's courage, their refusal to let this world forget him, became a beacon not only for myself, but for so many others worldwide," U.S. envoy Steve Witkoff said in a eulogy. "They reminded us that even in the darkness, light is not extinguished. It waits to be carried by those who refuse to give up."

Since the ceasefire began last month, militants have released the remains of 23 hostages. As part of the truce deal, the militants are expected to return all of the remains of hostages.

For each Israeli hostage returned, Israel has been releasing the remains of 15 Palestinians. Ahmed Dheir, director of forensic medicine at Nasser Hospital in the southern Gaza city of Khan Younis, said that the remains of 300 have now been returned, with 89 identified.

The war began with a Hamas-led attack on southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, in which around 1,200 people were killed, most of them civilians, and 251 people were kidnapped.

On Saturday, Gaza's Hamas-run Health Ministry said that the number of Palestinians killed in Gaza has risen to 69,176. The ministry, part of the Hamas-run government and staffed by medical professionals, maintains detailed records viewed as generally reliable by independent experts.

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