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Unresolved issues — mainly over the exchange of hostage and prisoner remains — threaten to destabilize the fragile agreement.
Oct. 16, 2025, 11:12 a.m. ET
The cease-fire between Israel and Hamas has held for almost a week now. But the deal rests on shaky ground, with a number of unresolved issues.
The primary source of tension at the moment is a dispute over the exchange of the remains of hostages taken from Israel two years ago for the bodies of Palestinian prisoners and detainees.
At the core of the problem is the deep enmity and fundamental mistrust between the two sides, neither of which believe the other is sincere about holding up their end of the agreement.
Here is where things stand:
The Return of Hostage Remains
By Thursday, Hamas had returned 10 bodies to Israel, most of them of former hostages. The cease-fire agreement stipulated that the group was supposed to immediately return all the remaining bodies in Gaza, believed to be roughly two dozen.
The agreement included an acknowledgment that the destruction in Gaza would make it difficult to find all the bodies quickly, and laid out a process for extending the deadline and providing assistance to recover remains.
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That process centers on the establishment of a joint task force, to include the United States and other mediators, that would pool information and help find the remaining bodies, according to three Israeli officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive issues.
Hamas’s military wing said on Wednesday night that it had handed over all of the remains of Israeli hostages that it had been able to recover without additional special equipment. Hamas has said it is doing all it can to locate and return the bodies but the process is hampered by the destruction in Gaza.
Some Israeli officials and hostage families have accused Hamas of violating the cease-fire deal.
Israel has said it was considering restrictions on aid in retaliation, according to two diplomats who were briefed by Israeli officials and spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive topics.
But three Israeli officials said earlier this week that they did not believe Hamas was slow-walking the process or acting in bad faith.
The Handover of Palestinian Bodies
Israel was supposed to return 15 Palestinian bodies to Gaza in exchange for every hostage body that it received.
By Thursday, it had returned 120 bodies to Gaza in exchange for the 10 bodies handed over by Hamas, fewer than required by the deal. Israeli officials did not immediately respond to requests for comment on why they had not handed over the full number.
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The bodies have been given to officials at Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis, who said they received no information about who they were or how Israel had them.
The bodies were labeled only with numbers assigned by Israel but no names, Gaza hospital officials said.
Increasing Aid to Gaza
The cease-fire deal calls for a significant expansion of aid in Gaza, including the entrance of at least 600 aid trucks per day.
The United Nations has said that more aid is entering Gaza now than before the cease-fire, which took effect on Friday. But it also said that Israel has not yet given aid groups the green light to ramp up deliveries enough to address the humanitarian crisis.
Stéphane Dujarric, a spokesman for the U.N. secretary general, said on Wednesday that U.N. teams had been largely unable to get any aid into Gaza for two days earlier this week.
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On Monday, the main crossings into Gaza, Kerem Shalom and Kissufim, were closed because the Israeli military was giving priority to the prisoner and hostage exchange. Aid was also unable to enter on Tuesday because aid workers could not collect cargo on the Gaza side of the crossing.
Mr. Dujarric said he did not know whether the goal of 600 trucks had been reached on any day this week.
Border Crossings
Israel had agreed to reopen the Rafah border crossing between Gaza and Egypt, which has been mostly closed since the war began. But it has not done so yet.
Israel has said it still planned to open it, but has not said when.
On Thursday, the Israeli military said the cease-fire deal did not call for aid to enter Gaza through Rafah, and that the crossing would only be open for people who wished to travel between Gaza and Egypt.
The Next Phase of Negotiations
The cease-fire deal that went into effect last week only addressed a handful of the points laid out by President Trump in his peace plan. In addition to the cease-fire and exchange of hostages and prisoners, Israeli forces pulled back from parts of Gaza.
But the deal left some of the most complicated issues to be negotiated at a later stage, including whether Hamas will give up its weapons, who will govern Gaza in the future and how will they govern it.
Those issues will be discussed during Phase 2 talks, but it is not clear when those will begin. An Israeli official said this week that a second round of talks would not start until the first phase was completed.
Natan Odenheimer, Aaron Boxerman and Rawan Sheikh Ahmad contributed reporting.
Liam Stack is a Times reporter who covers the culture and politics of the New York City region.
