Israel, Palestinian militants use bodies as bargaining chips

WEST BANK: More than a year after his son was killed by Israeli forces under disputed circumstances in the occupied West Bank, Mustafa Erekat is still seeking his remains.
It is one of dozens of cases in which Israel is holding the remains of Palestinians killed in conflict, citing the need to deter attacks and potentially exchange them for the remains of two Israeli soldiers held by the Palestinian militant group Hamas in the Gaza Strip.
The Palestinians and human rights groups view the practice of holding bodies as a form of collective punishment that inflicts further suffering on bereaved families.
“They have no right to keep my son, and it is my right for my son to have a good funeral,” Erekat said.
The Jerusalem Legal Aid and Human Rights Center, a Palestinian rights group, says Israel is holding the bodies of at least 82 Palestinians since the policy was established in 2015.
It says many are buried in secret cemeteries where the plots are only marked by plaques of numbers. Hamas holds the remains of the two Israeli soldiers killed during the 2014 Gaza war.
Defense Minister Benny Gantz said at the time that holding the remains deterred attacks and would help ensure the return of Israeli captives and remains. The Defense Ministry declined to comment on the policy.
One of the bodies is that of Erekat’s son, Ahmed, who Israeli officials say was shot and killed after deliberately plowing into a military checkpoint in June 2020.
Ahmed was to get married soon, his father said: “He had a house that was ready for him.” To this day, he has no idea where his son’s remains are.
Omar Shakir, the Israel and Palestine director at the New York-based Human Rights Watch, said Israel has turned “corpses into bargaining chips.” The policy is “deliberately and unlawfully punishing the families of the deceased, who are not accused of any wrongdoing,” he said.
Israel has a long history of exchanging prisoners and remains with its enemies.
In 2011, it traded more than 1,000 Palestinian prisoners for an Israeli soldier who had been captured by Palestinian militants five years earlier and was being held in Gaza.
In 2008, it traded five Lebanese prisoners and the remains of nearly 200 Lebanese and Palestinians killed in fighting, for the remains of two Israeli soldiers captured by Hezbollah group two years earlier.