By MELANIE LIDMAN and SAMY MAGDY, Associated Press
TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) — U.S. Vice President JD Vance arrived in Israel on Tuesday to shore up the fragile U.S.-brokered ceasefire in Gaza that has teetered over the past few days following a burst of deadly violence and questions over how to move forward with the plan for cementing a long-term peace.
Also Tuesday, Israel said it has identified the body of a hostage that was released by Palestinian militants overnight, while the chief Hamas negotiator said the group remains determined to implement the ceasefire agreement to end the two-year war.
Vance, who is accompanied by his wife, Usha Vance, will meet with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and is expected to stay in the region until Thursday. His visit follows that of two top White House envoys. After arrival, Vance held a working meeting at the airport with U.S. special envoy Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, President Donald Trump ’s former White House adviser and son-in-law.
Vance is to hold a news conference on Tuesday evening in Jerusalem and is also expected to meet with families of hostages whose bodies are still being held in Gaza and some of the living hostages released by the militants last week. Earlier on Tuesday, Witkoff and Kushner met in Tel Aviv with nine hostages who were released from captivity last week.
Israel identifies another body of a hostage
Israel confirmed that Hamas released the body of Tal Haimi, who was killed in the Hamas-led Oct. 7, 2023 terrorist attack that ignited the war. He was abducted from Kibbutz Nir Yitzhak on the Gaza border. The 42-year-old was a fourth-generation resident of the kibbutz and part of its emergency response team. He had four children, including one born after the attack.
Under the terms of the ceasefire, Israel is still waiting for Hamas to turn over the remains of 15 deceased hostages. Thirteen bodies have been released since the ceasefire began.
The Gaza Health Ministry, part of the Hamas-run government, said that Israel transferred the bodies of 15 Palestinians to Gaza as part of the ceasefire. The International Committee of the Red Cross handed over the bodies to the Nasser hospital in the southern city of Khan Younis, it said.
The new arrivals brought the number of bodies Israel sent back to Gaza to 165 since the exchanges started earlier this month, according to the health ministry.
Hamas says it’s committed to ending the war
After trading strikes earlier this week, Hamas negotiators reiterated that the group is committed to ensuring the war “ends once and for all.”
“From the day we signed the Sharm el-Sheikh agreement, we were determined and committed to seeing it through to the end,” Hamas chief negotiator Khalil al-Hayya, who is in Cairo, told Egypt’s Al-Qahera News television late Monday.
He said the Sharm el-Sheikh summit, hosted by Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi and U.S. President Donald Trump, represented “an international will declaring the war in Gaza is over.”
Al-Hayya said Hamas received assurances from mediators and Trump that “give us confidence that the war has ended for good.”
He said Israel has complied with aid deliveries in the crossings according to the agreement but asked mediators to pressure Israel to deliver more shelter, medical supplies and winterization items before the weather changes.
Meanwhile, the head of Egypt’s intelligence agency traveled to Israel on Tuesday to meet with Israeli officials and Witkoff over the implementations of the ceasefire, according to Egyptian media.
2 Israeli soldiers and 45 Palestinians are reported killed
On Sunday, Israel’s military said militants had fired at troops, killing two Israeli soldiers in areas of Rafah in southern Gaza that are under Israeli control as per agreed-on ceasefire lines.
Retaliatory strikes by Israel killed 45 Palestinians, according to the strip’s Health Ministry, which says a total of 80 people have been killed since the ceasefire took effect.
Similar strikes occurred on Monday in Gaza City and Khan Younis, where Israel said militants had crossed the yellow ceasefire line and posed an “immediate threat” to its troops.
The Israeli military said Monday it was using concrete barriers and painted poles to more clearly delineate the so-called yellow line in Gaza where troops have withdrawn to. It said several instances of violence have occurred.
Also on Tuesday, Qatar, a key mediator in the ceasefire, denounced Israel in a speech by its ruling emir. Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani said his nation would continue to serve as a mediator as a ceasefire holds in the Gaza Strip.
Sheikh Tamim specifically called Israel out for its “continued breaches of the ceasefire” in Gaza, as well as its expansion of settlements in the West Bank.
Doctors in Gaza say bodies returned with evidence of torture
A senior health official in the Gaza Strip said the bodies of Palestinians that Israel returned to Gaza as part of the ceasefire deal bore “evidence of torture” and called for an investigation.
Israel returned 150 bodies for Palestinians to Gaza as part of the ceasefire deal, which required the release of all of Israeli hostages — living and deceased — in return for the release of over 1,900 Palestinian prisoners and many bodies of Palestinians.
So far, only 32 of the returned bodies have been identified, according to the Gaza Health Ministry.
Dr. Muneer al-Boursh, the general director of the Health Ministry, said in a post of social media late Monday that some of the bodies had returned with evidence of being bound with ropes and metal shackles, blindfolds, deep wounds, abrasions, burns, and crushed limbs.
“What has happened constitutes a war crime and a crime against humanity,” he said, calling for the United Nations to launch an “urgent and independent international investigation.”
The Israel Prisons Service denied that prisoners had been mistreated.
“All inmates are held according to legal procedures, and their rights including access to medical care and adequate living conditions are upheld by professionally trained staff,” a spokesperson for the prison services said.
Israeli hostages released from Gaza have also reported being bound by metal shackles and harsh conditions, including frequent beatings and starvation.
Magdy reported from Cairo. Associated Press writer Jon Gambrell in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, contributed to this report.
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