The Israeli military said Wednesday that one of the bodies handed over by Hamas is not that of a hostage who was held in Gaza, adding to tensions over the fragile truce that has paused the two-year war.
Meanwhile, Gaza’s Health Ministry said it received 45 additional bodies of Palestinians from Israel, another step in the implementation of the ceasefire agreement. The bodies of 90 Palestinians have now been transferred. It was unclear whether the deceased died in Israeli custody or was taken from Gaza by Israeli troops while searching for hostages.
As part of the deal, four bodies of hostages were handed over by Hamas on Tuesday, following four on Monday that were returned hours after the last 20 living hostages were released from Gaza. In all, Israel has been awaiting the return of the bodies of 28 hostages.
The Israeli military said forensic testing showed that “the fourth body handed over to Israel by Hamas does not match any of the hostages.” There was no immediate word on whose body it was.
In exchange for the release of the hostages, Israel freed around 2,000 Palestinian prisoners and detainees Monday.
Entering the third week of a government shutdown, Democrats say they are not intimidated or cowed by President Donald Trump’s efforts to fire thousands of federal workers or by his threats of more firings to come.
Instead, Democrats appear emboldened, showing no signs of caving as they returned to Washington from their home states Tuesday evening and, for an eighth time, rejected a Republican bill to open the government.
“What people are saying is, you’ve got to stop the carnage,” said Virginia Sen. Tim Kaine, describing what he heard from his constituents, including federal workers, as he traveled around his state over the weekend. “And you don’t stop it by giving in.”
Hawaii Sen. Brian Schatz said the firings are “a fair amount of bluster” and he predicted they ultimately will be overturned in court or otherwise reversed. Sen. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut, speaking about Republicans, said the shutdown is just “an excuse for them to do what they were planning to do anyway.” And Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer of New York said Wednesday that the layoffs are a “mistaken attempt” to sway Democratic votes.
“Their intimidation tactics are not working,” added House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries of New York. “And will continue to fail.”
Democratic senators say they are hearing increasingly from voters about health insurance subsidies that expire at the end of the year, the issue that the party has made central to the shutdown fight.
Meta has removed a Facebook page used to track the presence of immigration agents at the request of the Department of Justice, the company confirmed on Tuesday.
Attorney General Pam Bondi said in a post on X that “following outreach” from the DOJ, Facebook removed a “large group page” that was being used to target ICE officials.
Meta said in a statement that the group “was removed for violating our policies against coordinated harm.”
Meta is the latest tech company to restrict tools used to track ICE agents on its platform. Earlier this month, Apple and Google blocked downloads of phone apps that flag sightings of U.S. immigration agents, just hours after the Trump administration demanded that one particularly popular iPhone app be taken down.
While a Facebook group for ICE sightings in Chicago does appear to have been taken down, as of Tuesday evening, dozens of other groups, some with thousands of members, remained visible on Facebook.
Kevin Lynch can be reached at lync1832@stthomas.edu.
