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Units from Egypt and the International Committee of the Red Cross have been granted permission to search for the bodies of deceased hostages taken during the 7 October attacks, Israeli authorities have verified.

The Israeli government stated that the crews have been allowed to operate past the referred to as "yellow line" in the area controlled by military personnel in the Gaza territory.

The group 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 remains of captives. The group said it is now coordinating with officials in Egypt.

Donald Trump has cautions Hamas to start return the bodies "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 Red Cross to locate the bodies, and would use digging equipment and vehicles for the search past the "yellow line".

The "demarcation line" indicates the border running along the north, southern and east of Gaza that Israeli forces withdrew to, as part of the initial phase of the ceasefire deal.

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

Egypt, along with Qatar and Turkey, is a key signatory of the Trump-brokered peace initiative for Gaza, which was ratified in the coastal city of Sharm el-Sheikh in recent weeks.

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 heavily involved in the repatriation of captives.

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

But the arrival of digging crews from Egypt inside the Gaza territory is a recent development.

After more than two years of intense bombardment by Israel, the United Nations calculates that as much as 84% of the area has been reduced to rubble.

Hamas says it is doing its best to retrieve remains of captives, but it faces difficulty finding them under debris of buildings bombed out by the IDF in the region.

It is now working in coordination with the Egyptian authorities.

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

"If the group put in greater work, they would be able to recover the bodies of our captives," the spokesperson said.

Trump shared on his Truth Social platform on the weekend that measures would be taken if the bodies of the hostages who died were not handed back promptly.

"A portion of the bodies are difficult to access, but others they can hand over at present and, for unknown reasons, they are not. Perhaps it has to do with their disarming," he said.

He added: "Let's see what they accomplish over the coming two days. I am monitoring the situation with great attention."

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

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

On Friday, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio indicated "a lot of countries" had volunteered to be part of the force - but noted Israeli authorities would have to be satisfied with those taking part.

This seemed like a allusion to the Turkish government, amid reports Israel had rejected the country's involvement.

It remained unclear, however, how such a force could be deployed without an agreement with the organization.

Israel initiated a armed operation in Gaza in response to the 7 October 2023 attack, in which militants associated with the group took the lives of about 1,200 individuals and captured 251 others as captives.

No fewer than 68,519 have been lost their lives in military actions in the region from that time, according to the territory's health authorities under the group's control.