United States President Donald Trump on Wednesday said that Israeli forces could resume fighting in Gaza “as soon as I say the word” if Hamas does not uphold its part of the ceasefire, CNN reported.
“Israel will return to those streets as soon as I say the word. If Israel could go in and knock the cr*p out of them, they’d do that,” Trump told CNN.
“What’s going on with Hamas – that’ll be straightened out quickly,” the US President said, while adding that he had to “hold back” Israel from the fighting.
This comes a day after Trump issued a warning to Hamas, asking the Palestinian group to disarm. “If they don’t disarm, we will disarm them. And it will happen quickly and perhaps violently,” Trump said in an interaction with reporters at the White House.
The US President also urged Hamas to return the bodies of the deceased Gaza hostages to Israel. Hamas had earlier released the 20 hostages who were alive. “Getting those 20 hostages out was paramount,” Trump said.
Hamas says handed over all hostage remains it can reach
The Red Cross on Wednesday received two more coffins of Gaza hostages, with Hamas saying it has handed over all remains it can reach.
Earlier, the Israeli military officials had said one of the bodies previously handed over by Hamas was not that of a hostage in Gaza.
Hamas had handed over bodies of four hostages on Monday, and another four on Tuesday. The group has till now handed over the mortal remains of nine of the 28 deceased hostages.
The Palestinian group said it had transferred all bodies it could find and would need specialist recovery equipment to retrieve the other remains from the Gaza ruins, according to AFP news agency.
“As for the remaining corpses, it requires extensive efforts and special equipment for their retrieval and extraction. We are exerting great effort in order to close this file,” a statement by the the Ezzedine Al-Qassam Brigades on social media stated.
