Israel has shared the intelligence it has on the location of deceased hostages’ bodies in Gaza with mediating countries in the US-backed Gaza ceasefire deal, an Israeli official disclosed Thursday evening.

“In coordination with the United States and the mediators,” said the official, “Israel is exerting pressure to complete the stage of returning all the bodies held by Hamas.”

Israel gave precise coordinates of locations where it believes hostages are buried to Egypt, Qatar, and Turkey, according to Channel 12 news.

A senior Israeli official told Channel 12 on Thursday that Israel does not believe the Hamas claim that it can not locate any of the remaining hostages’ remains.

“There is a double-digit number of hostages that it can return,” the official asserted.

The terror group handed over nine of the 28 slain hostages it held at the beginning of the week, leaving 19 more bodies that had yet to be returned to Israel under the ceasefire agreement.

The truce now faces hurdles as deceased captives are handed over at a snail’s pace, despite the deal’s stipulation that all hostages, living and dead, were to be returned within 72 hours of the deal taking effect.

Hamas had earlier warned that it may not be able to locate all dead hostages within the deadline, prompting the establishment of a joint multinational task force to locate the remaining bodies in the wartorn enclave.

As part of the efforts to recover the hostages’ remains, Turkey said it has deployed dozens of disaster relief experts to the Strip to search for the bodies.

A Turkish defense ministry source said Thursday that “there is already a team of 81 AFAD staff there,” referring to Turkey’s disaster relief agency, indicating that “one team will be in charge of seeking and finding the bodies.”

As Turkey dispatched its teams, a European diplomat told The Times of Israel that the American role in the emerging International Security Force for Gaza remains ill-defined, which has stifled the mission.

“The intention of the US is not completely clear,” said the official. “It’s not yet clear if it’s just to set up a C2 [command and control] structure and that’s it, or if they’re going to also participate in the force itself on the ground.”

He indicated that the potential participation of some Arab countries would depend on America’s next moves, saying many nations are interested but seeking a guarantee that US forces will be in the field.

The mandate of the force also remained in the air: “Would it be safeguarding order? Would it be rather a mission of training Palestinian forces? And in this case, where and how many? There are a lot of things that remain blurred for now,” the diplomat said.

Discussions are taking place right now between governments, but representatives could gather in Egypt next week. The diplomat said there should be clarity “in the coming days.”

Israeli officials, hostage families losing patience

Contradicting assessments made by senior US officials, Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar said Thursday that Hamas could give back more slain hostages and is purposefully slow-walking the returns.

In Rome with his Italian counterpart Antoni Tajani, Sa’ar stressed “that Israel knows full well that Hamas is capable of returning additional bodies and is choosing not to do so,” according to his office. He called the delay an “extremely serious matter.”

Earlier, the Hostages and Missing Families Forum demanded that the government delay implementing the next stages of the truce if Hamas fails to return the remaining bodies.

“At a time that Hamas is violating the agreements and still holding 19 hostages, there is no room for Israel to advance unilateral steps,” the group said in a statement. “Any diplomatic or military action that does not ensure their return is an abandonment of Israel’s civilians.”

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu convened a meeting with close advisers Thursday night on possible reactions to what Israel calls Hamas violations of the ceasefire agreement.

Security officials are suggesting preventing materials for rebuilding Gaza from entering the Strip, or delaying the opening of Rafah Crossing for people, Channel 12 reported.

According to Trump’s 20-point plan for Gaza, the next phases of the truce should include the disarmament of Hamas, the offer of amnesty to Hamas leaders who decommission their weapons and establishing the governance of post-war Gaza.

Defense Minister Israel Katz warned Wednesday that if Hamas fails to return the bodies, Israel “will resume fighting and act to achieve a total defeat of Hamas, to change the reality in Gaza and achieve all the objectives of the war.”

But Trump appeared to call for patience while speaking to reporters that same day, in an effort to safeguard the deal. “It’s a gruesome process, I almost hate to talk about it, but they’re digging, they’re actually digging,” he said of Hamas’s search for hostages’ remains.

“There are areas where they are digging and they’re finding a lot of bodies… And some of those bodies have been in there a long time, and some of them are under rubble.”

Speaking to reporters on Thursday, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said, “It’s going to take some time and some special equipment” to retrieve the remaining 19 bodies.

In the lead-up to Wednesday night’s handover of two bodies, Hamas’s military wing claimed it had met its obligations under the deal by returning all living hostages to Israel, and the bodies of all the dead captives “that it was able to reach.”

Israel, meanwhile, returned the bodies of 30 Palestinians to Gaza on Thursday, the territory’s Hamas-run health ministry said. Under the ceasefire deal, Israel was to turn over the bodies of 15 Palestinians for every deceased Israeli returned.