The Israeli government expressed outrage on Wednesday after a forensic examination revealed that one of the bodies delivered by Hamas via the Red Cross was not of an Israeli hostage, but of a Palestinian from Gaza.
Hamas agreed to deliver the bodies of 28 hostages who died or were murdered in captivity, in addition to the 20 living hostages that were returned to Israel on Monday. It only delivered four bodies on Monday, and four more on Tuesday — one of which turned out to be the body of a dead Gazan.
The Times of Israel reported:
Military representatives on Wednesday morning notified the families of three Israeli hostages that the bodies of their loved ones were returned to Israel by Hamas the night prior, including one whose death had not been confirmed by Israel until now. A fourth body transferred to Israel by the terror group belonged to an unidentified Palestinian, according to Israeli authorities.
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The handover happened after Israel accused Hamas of violating the recently implemented ceasefire by withholding the bodies of deceased hostages. Hamas released the final 20 living hostages on Monday, as well as the bodies of four dead captives. Under the terms of the ceasefire, all 28 deceased captives were supposed to be returned.
After returning the remains of three captives on Tuesday, the terror group currently still holds the bodies of 21 dead hostages.
Shosh Bedrosian, a spokesperson for the prime minister’s office, said: “It is confirmed the [fourth] body is not of a hostage. … Hamas, the terror organization is required to uphold its commitments … and return all our hostages as part of the implementation of this agreement. We will not compromise on this. … [Hamas] made specific confirmation to President Trump.”
Hamas has previously returned the wrong body in another exchange, sending a Palestinian corpse to Israel in February instead of the body of Shiri Bibas, 33, the mother of the Bibas children, who were also murdered.
It is unclear what consequences there will be if Hamas continues to fail to comply with the agreement. Israel has refused to reopen the Rafah Crossing between Gaza and Egypt, and has restricted the flow of aid, in response to Hamas’s non-compliance, and President Donald Trump warned Tuesday that the U.S. will forcibly disarm Hamas if it continues to delay.
One of the bodies returned on Monday was not that of an Israeli, but that of Bipin Joshi, 25, a Nepalese student who was the last foreign hostage in Gaza. His family, which had held out hope for his survival, was devastated.
Breitbart News asked Bedrosian about the fact that many hostage families had pointedly excluded Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu when thanking Israeli and U.S. authorities.
She said: “This is a democracy, anyone can say what they want, they can protest, that’s the power of Israel, a western civilization.”
Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of The Zionist Conspiracy Wants You, now available on Amazon. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.
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