Israel will reopen Gaza's Rafah crossing with Egypt for the passage of people only after an operation to locate the body of the last remaining Israeli hostage in the enclave is completed, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office said late on Sunday.
The border was supposed to have opened during the initial phase of US President Donald Trump's plan to end the war, under a ceasefire reached in October between Israel and Hamas. US envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner were in Israel on Sunday and were reportedly pushing for the reopening of the crossing before finding the last hostage's body, prompting criticism from the far-right.
Israel has conditioned the reopening on the return of all living hostages held by Palestinian militant factions in Gaza, as well as a “100 per cent effort” by Hamas to locate and return the bodies of all deceased hostages.
All have been returned except for the body of police officer Ran Gvili. The Israeli army said on Sunday that it had launched a “targeted operation” in northern Gaza to retrieve his remains, while an Israeli army official said there were “several intelligence leads” regarding his possible location.
The Israeli army “is currently conducting a focused operation to exhaust all of the intelligence that has been gathered in the effort to locate and return the fallen hostage, Master Sgt. Ran Gvili, of blessed memory,” Mr Netanyahu's office said.
It added that when the operation is complete, “Israel will open the Rafah Crossing”. No timeline was provided for how long the operation would take.
During a security Cabinet meeting on Sunday evening, far-right ministers reportedly criticised the decision to open the crossing. “We did great things like kill tens of thousands of terrorists, but we still haven’t completely eliminated Hamas,” National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir said, according to quotes reported by the Walla news site.
On Thursday, Ali Shaath, head of a transitional Palestinian committee backed by the US to temporarily administer Gaza, said the Rafah Crossing would open this week. It is effectively the sole route in or out of Gaza for nearly all of the more than 2 million people who live there.
The Gaza side of the crossing has been under Israeli army control since 2024.
“As part of President Trump's 20-point plan, Israel has agreed to a limited reopening of the Rafah Crossing for pedestrian passage only, subject to a full Israeli inspection mechanism,” Mr Netanyahu's office said.
This month, Washington announced the plan had moved into the second phase, under which Israel is expected to withdraw troops further from Gaza and Hamas is due to yield control of the territory's administration.
However, despite a truce being in place, Israel has continued to carry out attacks in the war-ravaged enclave. Israeli fire killed three Palestinians in two separate incidents in the Gaza Strip on Sunday, while an Israeli drone wounded four others in Gaza city, the territory's health ministry said.
