Hamas has handed over four bodies of Israelis taken captive during the October 2023 attacks.
The bodies that were handed over were those of a woman, her two young children and an elderly man. Hamas maintains they were killed in an Israeli air strike during the war.
A Hamas spokesman said it had “preserved the lives of the occupation prisoners” and “treated them humanely", before "Zionist occupation aircraft deliberately bombed the locations where they were being held”.
The handover was facilitated by the Red Cross, in a public handover ceremony in Khan Younis, southern Gaza.
The bodies were delivered in four coffins in front of a poster depicting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu with fangs and blood on his face. Red Cross staff put up white screens to conceal coffins from large crowds.
“These operations should be done privately out of the utmost respect for the deceased and for those left grieving,” the International Committee of the Red Cross said in a statement.
Meanwhile, just hours later, in the Tel-Aviv area Israeli police reported a series of explosions on buses as a “suspected terror attack”, but with no injuries reported so far.
Israeli police said three bombs exploded while two were defused at separate locations involving buses in central Israel on Thursday evening.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu confirmed the explosive incident in a statement, and said it would “soon hold a security assessment”.
