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Teams from Egypt and the ICRC have been authorized to search for the remains of deceased hostages taken during the 7 October attacks, Israeli authorities have verified.

The Israeli government announced that the crews have been allowed to search beyond the so-called "demarcation line" in the area controlled by military personnel in the Gaza territory.

Hamas has handed over 15 out of 28 deceased Israeli hostages under the initial stage of a US-brokered truce agreement, which requires it to hand over all hostage bodies. The organization stated it is now working together with officials in Egypt.

Donald Trump has cautions the organization to start return the remains "quickly, or the additional nations involved in this significant peace will take action".

An official representative indicated the crew from Egypt has been authorized to collaborate with the ICRC to locate the remains, and would use excavator machines and trucks for the search beyond the "yellow line".

The "yellow line" marks the boundary running along the northern, southern and east of the Gaza territory that Israel pulled back to, as part of the first stage of the ceasefire deal.

Until now, Israeli authorities has not approved the entry of such teams.

The Egyptian government, along with Qatari officials and Turkish authorities, is a principal participant of the Trump-brokered Gaza peace plan, which was ratified in the coastal city of Sharm el-Sheikh earlier this month.

The development will be greeted positively by relatives, eager to give them a proper burial.

The International Committee of the Red Cross has already been deeply engaged in the return of captives.

The organization does not hand over its captives - alive or deceased - directly to the Israel Defense Forces, but rather to the ICRC, which in turn escorts them through the territory and transfers them to the IDF.

But the entry of Egyptian excavation teams inside the Gaza territory is a recent development.

After more than 24 months of heavy shelling by Israel, the United Nations estimates that as much as 84% of the area has been destroyed completely.

Hamas claims it is doing its best to retrieve hostage bodies, but it encounters challenges finding them under rubble of structures destroyed by the IDF in the region.

It is now coordinating with the Egyptian authorities.

On Sunday, an official representative said that the organization was aware of where the remains were.

"If Hamas made more of an effort, they would be able to recover the bodies of our captives," the representative said.

Trump shared on his social media account on the weekend that measures would be taken if the remains of the deceased hostages were not handed back quickly.

"Some of the remains are difficult to access, but others they can hand over at present and, for some reason, they are not. Perhaps it has do with their disarming," he said.

Trump added: "Let's see what they do over the next 48 hours. I am watching this with great attention."

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On Sunday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel would determine which foreign forces it would permit as part of a proposed international force in the region to help secure the ceasefire under the former president's initiative.

"We are in command of our safety, and we have also made it clear regarding foreign troops that we will decide which units are unacceptable to us, and this is how we function and will continue to operate," he declared speaking at the start of a cabinet meeting.

On the end of the week, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio indicated "numerous countries" had offered to be part of the contingent - but noted Israeli authorities would have to be comfortable with those taking part.

This appeared to be a reference to Turkey, amid accounts Israeli officials had vetoed the nation's participation.

It remained unclear, however, how this contingent could be stationed without an agreement with the organization.

The Israeli military initiated a armed operation in the territory in following the 7 October 2023 attack, in which militants associated with the group killed about twelve hundred people and captured two hundred fifty-one additional persons as captives.

At least sixty-eight thousand five hundred nineteen have been lost their lives in Israeli attacks in Gaza since then, according to the territory's health authorities under the group's control.