according to the Israeli prime minister's office. Israeli forces will now transfer the bodies to the National Centre of Forensic Medicine in Tel Aviv for identification. Hamas's armed wing announced earlier that it had recovered the bodies of Israeli hostages Amiram Cooper and Sahar Baruch. On Tuesday, the Israeli government accused Hamas of violating the Gaza ceasefire deal after the group handed over a coffin containing human remains that did not belong to one of the 13 deceased Israeli and foreign hostages still in Gaza.

It said forensic tests showed they belonged to Ofir Tzarfati, a hostage whose body had been recovered by Israeli forces in Gaza in late 2023. The Israeli military also released footage filmed by a drone that showed Hamas members removing a body bag containing the remains from a building in Gaza City, reburying it, and then staging the discovery in front of Red Cross staff. The Red Cross said its staff were unaware that the body bag had been moved before their arrival and that the staged recovery was "unacceptable". Hamas rejected what it called the "baseless allegations" and accused Israel of "seeking to fabricate false pretexts in preparation for taking new aggressive steps". (BBC)