The brigades said in a statement: "The occupation bears full responsibility for the clash with our fighters in Rafah who are defending themselves within an area under its control," stressing that "the principle of surrender or handing oneself over to the enemy does not exist in the Qassam dictionary."
The statement added that Israel is being intransigent in resolving the crisis of the Qassam fighters trapped in Rafah, despite the efforts made by mediators, foremost among them Egypt, to find a way out of the crisis, calling on the mediators to assume their responsibilities to ensure the continuation of the ceasefire.
In a related development, the Qassam Brigades announced their intention to hand over the body of captured Israeli officer Hadar Goldin, who was captured during the 2014 aggression on Gaza, at 2:00 PM on Sunday, Gaza time.
Earlier today, Hebrew media quoted political and security sources as saying that mediators and Hamas are discussing a swap: handing over Goldin's remains in exchange for the release of about 200 Palestinian fighters trapped in the Rafah tunnels.
Al Jazeera reported that Hamas, with the help of a team from the International Committee of the Red Cross, retrieved Goldin's body from a tunnel west of Rafah, while the official Israeli Broadcasting Authority confirmed that Tel Aviv "views with grave concern the delay in receiving the remains" and demands their immediate return.
The agency added that Israel sees Hamas’s move as an attempt to link the handover of the remains to new negotiations regarding the besieged Palestinian fighters, while another Israeli source stressed that “there will be no new deal,” and that these fighters “will either be eliminated or surrender for interrogation at the Sde Teiman base,” which is known for its mistreatment of prisoners.
Since the ceasefire agreement came into effect on October 10, Hamas has handed over 20 living Israeli prisoners and the remains of 25 others out of 28, while Israel says that some of the remains are not new or do not belong to its prisoners, and is waiting to receive the remaining 5 bodies.
This tension comes at a time when Israel is accused of violating the agreement daily by bombing areas in Gaza that have killed hundreds of Palestinians, in addition to restricting the entry of food and medical aid into the sector.
According to the government media office in Gaza, the number of missing Palestinians exceeds 9,500, whose bodies are still under the rubble, while more than 10,000 Palestinian prisoners are languishing in Israeli prisons, suffering harsh conditions of torture, starvation, and medical neglect.
The ceasefire agreement ended an Israeli war of extermination that began on October 7, 2023, and left 69,169 Palestinian martyrs and 170,685 wounded, most of them children and women.
