Israel is holding the bodies of around 1,700 Palestinians for possible use in future exchanges, despite no Israeli captives being held by Hamas, the Haaretz daily reported Monday.
The figure was raised during recent discussions within Israel’s security establishment, the newspaper said, citing two unnamed sources familiar with the matter.
Shin Bet chief David Zini supports retaining the bodies in case Israelis are taken captive or go missing in the future, a position also backed by the Israeli army, according to the report.
Haaretz said most of the bodies belong to Palestinians from Gaza who took part in the October 7, 2023 attack on Israel or subsequent fighting.
Some, however, belong to Palestinians who were not involved in the fighting, it said.
Legal sources cited by Haaretz questioned Israel’s authority to retain the bodies, saying the state lacks the power to hold the remains of Palestinians with no proven involvement in fighting unless the Security Cabinet first establishes a policy on the matter.
In October 2025, the Palestinian National Campaign for the Retrieval of Martyrs’ Bodies and Disclosure of the Fate of the Missing said Israel was holding around 1,500 bodies of Palestinians from Gaza at the Sde Teiman military facility in southern Israel.
The Israeli army continues to target Palestinians in several areas of the Gaza despite an Israel-Hamas ceasefire that went into effect on October 10, 2025, killing at least 1,258 Palestinians and injuring 4,139 others, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry.
Israel has killed more than 73,000 Palestinians and injured over 174,000 in a genocidal war since October 2023. The war has also caused widespread destruction, affecting 90 percent of the enclave’s infrastructure.
