Steve Witkoff ‘confident’ Gaza hostage remains will be returned

WASHINGTON — President Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff said Thursday that he’s “confident” that the remains of all Israeli hostages will be returned from the Gaza Strip — as he predicted a significant expansion of the Abraham Accords following the cease-fire he helped broker with Hamas.

“We’ve gotten 10 back and we will pursue the return of the balance of the deceased until they all will come home and I’m confident” that it will happen,” Witkoff said in a speech at the US Holocaust Memorial Museum.

Witkoff, who alongside Jared Kushner sealed the deal to halt fighting and release all 20 living hostages Monday, said that “nothing is more sacred than a family’s right to bury” their relatives and that the US is working to secure the release of “all the bodies,” a matter that has embroiled Israelis.

US officials revealed Wednesday that a Turkish team experienced in the recovery of bodies following earthquakes would assist in retrieving remains, partnering with Israeli intelligence.

“When America leaves with clarity and conviction, peace follows inevitably, and the world becomes safer for generations to come,” Witkoff told the gathering, which included nearly two dozen Holocaust survivors as well as a former hostage taken at the Nova music festival and an Israeli soldier who responded to Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, surprise attack on Israel that killed about 1,200.

“As we look ahead, we are deeply committed to substantially expanding the Abraham Accords, building on the foundation of trust, mutual respect that President Trump forged between Israel and its Arab neighbors,” Witkoff said.

“I’ve also traveled to Gaza multiple times. Each time I wear my black MAGA hat and people come up to me on the Gaza side because they want peace too,” he said.

“They want stability and opportunity and a better life for their children.”

He said the transition following fighting “must include jobs, education and hope — aspirations, not just guns and violence” for the people of Gaza, to “bring dignity to those who suffered far too long.”

“Hamas must unequivocally disarm, and they have no future in Gaza,” he added, another major unresolved element of Trump’s 20-point peace plan — with the president threatening hours earlier to sanction other nations to “go in and kill” Hamas members if they continue reprisal executions.

The event, commemorating the second anniversary of the Oct. 7 massacre, was organized in part by Witkoff’s son Alex, who was appointed by Trump to the US Holocaust Memorial Council.

Witkoff, a billionaire businessman whose broad portfolio includes assisting negotiations to end the Russia-Ukraine was, said that his work is motivated in part by the overdose death of his son Andrew.

“Each time I meet a hostage family, I carry the memory of my boy who left the world far too soon. Their pain felt deeply personal to me. From that pain came purpose to make sure that no other parent, no family, to the best of our ability, ever endures that agony alone,” he said.

“That sense of shared humanity, of transforming grief into action, has driven me every step of the way.”