Israel has identified the body of the hostage returned by Hamas on Thursday as that of Meny Godard, who was 73 years old when he was killed in the October 7 attacks.
Red Cross vehicles picked up his body hours after Hamas issued a joint statement with Palestinian Islamic Jihad saying he had been located in the Khan Younis area of southern Gaza.
The Israeli prime minister’s office said forensic tests confirmed that the body belonged to Godard, who was killed along with his wife, Ayelet, during the Hamas attack on Kibbutz Be’eri on October 7, 2023.
Three of the 28 dead hostages remain in Gaza, and the first phase of the current ceasefire agreement is part of a US plan to end the Gaza war.
Under the ceasefire agreement, Hamas agreed to return the 20 live and 28 dead hostages it still held.
All living Israeli hostages were released on October 13 in exchange for 250 Palestinian prisoners and 1,718 Gaza detainees.
For every dead Israeli hostage returned, Israel has agreed to hand over the remains of 15 Palestinians. But since there is no DNA testing available in Gaza, it is difficult to identify them.
Hamas took 251 hostages when it launched the deadly attack in southern Israel on October 7, 2023, during which it killed 1,200 people.
More than 69,000 Palestinians have been killed in Israel’s retaliatory response, according to the Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry, whose figures the UN considers reliable.
Of the three bodies still found in Gaza, two are Israeli and one is Thai.
Israel has accused Hamas of deliberately delaying the recovery of the hostages’ bodies, but Hamas has said it is struggling to find them under the rubble.
Slow progress has meant there has been no progress in the second phase of US President Donald Trump’s Gaza peace plan.
This includes plans for the governance of Gaza, the withdrawal of Israeli troops, the disarmament of Hamas and the reconstruction of the Gaza Strip.
