‘A death sentence to all hostages': Israel plan to take control of Gaza City met with dismay
's security cabinet has approved a plan to take control of
Gaza
City. The move, which expands military operations in the shattered Palestinian territory, has drawn fresh criticism of Israel's actions at home and abroad.
Germany
, a key European ally, announced it would
halt exports of military equipment to Israel
that could be used in Gaza.
Britain
urged Israel to reconsider its decision to escalate the Gaza military campaign.
However,
US
president
Donald Trump
's ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee, told Reuters that some countries appeared to be putting pressure on Israel rather than on the militant group Hamas, whose deadly attack on Israel in 2023 ignited the war.
In Israel, families of hostages held by militants in Gaza, as well as opposition leaders, criticised prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu for a decision they said would put hostages' lives at risk.
READ MORE
Far-right allies in Mr Netanyahu's coalition have been pushing for a total takeover of Gaza as part of his vow to eradicate Hamas militants, though the military has warned this could endanger the lives of remaining hostages held by militants.
Opposition leader Yair Lapid called the decision to send Israeli forces into Gaza City a disaster, saying it defied the advice of military and security officials.
He accused far-right ministers Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich of dragging Mr Netanyahu into a prolonged campaign that would result in the deaths of hostages and soldiers.
Mr Netanyahu told Fox News's Bill Hemmer in an interview on Thursday that the military intended to take control of all of Gaza.
The announcement from the prime minister's office early on Friday after Thursday's security cabinet meeting said the military would take Gaza City, but did not say if Israeli forces would take all of the enclave. Israel's cabinet is expected to endorse the Gaza City plan.
The military has said that it controls around 75 per cent of Gaza. Amir Avivi, a retired Israeli brigadier general, estimated that if the military did take Gaza City, it would give Israel control of about 85 per cent of the strip.
'Gaza City is the heart of Gaza. It's really the centre of government. It has always been the strongest and even in the eyes of Hamas, the fall of Gaza City is pretty much the fall of Hamas,' said Mr Avivi. 'Taking over Gaza City is a game changer.'
Israeli media have said 900,000 people now live in Gaza City, including many who have been displaced by the military.
Before the war, Hamas's most powerful fighting units were believed to operate in northern Gaza, including Gaza City.
In the Fox News interview, Mr Netanyahu said Israel did not want to keep the Gaza Strip, but to establish a 'security perimeter' and to hand over the territory to Arab forces.
There are 50 hostages still held in Gaza, of whom Israeli officials believe 20 are alive. Most of those freed so far emerged as a result of diplomatic negotiations. Talks toward a ceasefire that could have seen more hostages released collapsed in July.
European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen was among foreign leaders urging Israel to reconsider its decision to advance into Gaza City.
Regional power Saudi Arabia, which has said it could not normalise ties with Israel without the establishment of a Palestinian state, condemned any move to occupy Gaza.
Asked in an interview with Reuters about criticism of Israel's decision to escalate the war, US ambassador Huckabee questioned why some nations were 'once again' placing 'all the pressure on Israel' instead of on Hamas.
Mr Huckabee said Mr Trump was frustrated that Hamas is unwilling to reach 'any kind of reasonable settlement', adding the president insists that the militant group cannot remain in power and must disarm.
Israel had already come under mounting pressure at home and abroad over the war in Gaza, including over the humanitarian disaster in the enclave. In recent weeks, Britain, Canada and France said they could recognise a Palestinian state at the upcoming UN General Assembly.
Mr Netanyahu has said there will be no end to the war until Hamas is disarmed. Opinion polls have shown that a majority of Israelis believe he should end the war immediately in a diplomatic agreement that would see the release of remaining hostages.
The Hostages Families Forum, which represents many families of captives in Gaza, said the pursuit of occupying Gaza means abandoning the hostages all while ignoring public support to immediately end the war in a deal that releases the hostages.
It said in a statement the security cabinet had chosen to 'embark on another march of recklessness, on the backs of the hostages, the soldiers and Israeli society as a whole'.
'I think it's a death sentence to all the hostages that are still being held there. And it's the wrong decision to do it at this time,' Danny Bukovsky, a hotelier in Tel Aviv, said of the announcement that Israeli forces would move into Gaza City.
A full occupation of Gaza would reverse a 2005 decision in which Israel withdrew thousands of Jewish settlers and its forces, while retaining control over its borders, airspace and utilities. – Reuters
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Irish Times
37 minutes ago
- Irish Times
Why has Gazans' hunger attained the status of ‘moral crisis' when Israel's genocidal slaughter did not?
For the better part of two years now, we have watched in horror and helplessness as Israel has carried out its campaign of genocidal slaughter against the Palestinians of Gaza . We have seen tens of thousands of children murdered – blown to pieces, shot by Israeli snipers, crushed beneath the concrete of their ruined homes. We have seen cruelty and depravity almost beyond comprehension, and have heard countless statements of intent, from those who wield power in Israel, to continue this slaughter until there is no building left to be levelled, no life left to be crushed. And in this time, those of us who have spoken out about this horror, who have called it by its proper name, have asked a single question: when will it be enough? When will those powerful people and institutions who have turned a blind eye to this savagery, or who have deemed it sadly necessary for the defence of a western ally against its enemies, say that even they can stomach no more? That time, it seems, may finally have come. In recent days, as Israel's deliberate starvation of the population of Gaza has been laid bare for all to see, a number of prominent and powerful people who have previously supported the Israel Defense Forces's right to do whatever it pleases in Gaza have had a public change of heart. Ursula von der Leyen, the president of the European Commission, claims to have seen enough. 'The images from Gaza are unbearable,' she announced in a social media post in late July, as the sickening reality of starvation became too forceful for even her to ignore. 'Civilians in Gaza have suffered too much, for too long. It must stop now.' READ MORE These sentiments, coming from a politician who has long been among the most steadfast and powerful facilitators of Israel's slaughter of Palestinians, ring somewhat hollow. 'In the face of genocide and engineered starvation,' as Hussein Baoumi, deputy Middle East and North African director of Amnesty International put it, her statement was 'too little, too late'. [ As an Irish Jew my Star of David is no longer a badge of pride but a mark of shame Opens in new window ] The UK prime minister, Keir Starmer, has come to realise he cannot be seen to unquestioningly support Israel when it is deliberately starving the population of Gaza. He announced, in recent days, that his government will formally recognise a Palestinian state before the next meeting of the UN general assembly next month unless Israel commits to a ceasefire, and to a two-state solution. The Palestinian people, of course, have a right to self-determination, and Palestinian statehood is already recognised by 147 of the UN's member states including, as of last year, Ireland. So Starmer's use of this recognition as a bargaining chip is profoundly questionable. The Canadian government has announced similar plans, as has France – though neither has included anything like the UK's abject condition of qualification. Starmer has, of course, been one of the most persistent supporters of Israel, throughout its long and bloody campaign of mass murder and ethnic cleansing. In November 2023, in response to the cutting off of water and electricity supplies to Gaza, he defended what he called Israel's 'right' to do so. He has since then gone out of his way to delegitimise and suppress protest against the genocide; in a highly controversial piece of recent legislation , his government designated the group Palestine Action a terrorist organisation, though its actions have been entirely non-violent. [ MSF calls for immediate closure of 'lethal' Israeli Gaza aid sites Opens in new window ] Even the editorial board of The New York Times, a newspaper whose tendency to view everything from the Israeli point of view has been so overwhelming as to make it frequently useless as a source of information on the conflict, has seemed, in recent days, to question Israel's actions in Gaza. Last week, in an op-ed tilted 'Gaza's Hunger Is a Moral Crisis', the editorial board acknowledged people were now starving to death, and called for the Israeli government to allow food deliveries, and to work towards a ceasefire. So what has changed? What is it about the spectacle of widespread starvation that has provoked the kind of moral response which endless months of genocidal slaughter did not? Why has hunger attained the status of 'moral crisis', when the deliberate bombing of civilian targets, the relentless killing of defenceless Palestinian men, women, and children, in their tens of thousands, never quite did? One way of answering the question might be to look at the language of that New York Times editorial. Reread, first of all, that headline: 'Gaza's Hunger Is a Moral Crisis'. Not Israel's use of starvation as a deliberate strategy of war, but Gaza's hunger. You cannot prosecute a moral crisis in The Hague. Hunger is not a war crime. Contrast this language with that of the International Criminal Court, which, in issuing its arrest warrants against Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu and former defence minister Yoav Gallant, made special mention of Israel's 'use of starvation as a weapon of war'. It is much easier to speak out about a famine than it is about a campaign of mass slaughter, about the relentless bombing of homes and schools and universities and hospitals and refugee camps, because it is easier to view famine as a kind of free-floating, atmospheric misfortune, as a regrettable byproduct of war, as opposed to what, in this case, it actually is: an act of war in itself, and one explicitly outlawed by the Geneva conventions and by the UN. The New York Times invoking a 'moral crisis'; Ursula von der Leyen announcing that Gaza's civilians have suffered enough; Keir Starmer's sudden realisation of what he calls 'the pressing need for Israel to change course': none of this is any more than a shift in rhetorical positioning, the striking of a pose of moral condemnation. And all of it is predicated on an increasingly preposterous political fiction: that Israel has temporarily, if disastrously, strayed from its path of justice and morality, and that it can be somehow prevailed upon to return once more to that path. [ Occupied Territories Bill: US Congress group asks that Ireland be added to list of countries boycotting Israel Opens in new window ] No one understands the hollowness of this rhetoric better than Israel's government, who are perfectly content to let such rhetoric do its harmless work, seeming to launder the consciences of those who have, for close to two years, facilitated this campaign of genocide. And although the language may, for now, have changed its course, the weapons are still travelling in the same direction: from Europe and America to Israel, and onward, from there, to Gaza.
Irish Independent
an hour ago
- Irish Independent
The Irish Independent's View: If we thought the war on Gaza could not be escalated any further, Benjamin Netanyahu is proving us wrong
Israel's declaration to take control of Gaza City, a move that could displace one million Palestinians, can only open another unfathomable seam of suffering for people already fighting starvation and in fear for the lives. Aid agencies say many people have already been forced to flee several times. But they no longer have food, means of transport or a safe place to go. Apart from the anticipated wave of international alarm, Netanyahu's plan for a deeper military push into Gaza has brought warnings from the Israeli military's leadership, and fierce criticism from families of the hostages held in Gaza by Hamas. Concerns that more Palestinians will inevitably be killed were raised by UK prime minister Keir Starmer. Even Germany, one of Israel's staunchest allies and one of its largest suppliers of arms, has said it is suspending military exports over the move. Chancellor Friedrich Merz said his government remained deeply concerned about the ongoing suffering of the civilian population in the Gaza Strip. Moves by France, the UK and Canada to recognise a Palestinian state had added pressure on Berlin. But Israel's opposition leader Yair Lapid also attacked the plan, saying it will lead 'to many more disasters'. He said it was 'a surrender' to Netanyahu's far-right coalition members 'in complete contradiction to the opinion of the military'. Those surveying the devastation and deprivation in Gaza would have thought it unimaginable that there could be any way to further escalate a conflict that has already turned the enclave into a living hell, with the death toll passing 61,000 this week. Israel has already been plunged into international isolation over the spiralling humanitarian cost of the war. The Netherlands has revoked permits for the export of naval ship components to Israel, while Turkey condemned the new offensive and called on the UN to prevent its implementation. Meanwhile, in Brussels, EU Council president Antonio Costa said the move to take over Gaza City 'must have consequences for EU-Israel relations'. In Gaza City, the BBC quoted a Dr Hatem Qanoua who said: 'I'm very afraid for my children and all the innocent people who may die. They've only known death and destruction.' Since the start of this year, at least 99 people, including 29 children under the age of five, have died of malnutrition, according to the World Health Organisation, which says its figures are likely underestimates. Mr Netanyahu has turned a deaf ear to the world, but the words of Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel demand attention: 'I don't think I should accept other people's suffering because I suffered. Just the opposite: because I suffered, I don't want others to suffer.'
Irish Independent
an hour ago
- Irish Independent
Germany halts weapons exports to Israel as outrage grows over Gaza City plan
Germany, a key European ally, announced it would halt exports to Israel of military equipment that could be used in Gaza – a decision prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu called disappointing. Britain and other European allies urged Israel to reconsider its decision to escalate the Gaza military campaign. The US ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee, said some countries appeared to be putting pressure on Israel rather than on the militant group Hamas, whose deadly attack on Israel in 2023 ignited the war. In Israel, opposition leaders and families of hostages held by militants in Gaza blasted Mr Netanyahu for a decision that they said would put hostages' lives at risk. Far-right allies in the prime minister's coalition have been pushing for a total takeover of Gaza as part of Mr Netanyahu's vow to eradicate Hamas militants, though the military has warned this could endanger the lives of remaining hostages. Opposition leader Yair Lapid called the decision to send Israeli forces into Gaza City a disaster, saying it defied the advice of military and security officials. He accused far-right ministers Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich of dragging Mr Netanyahu into a prolonged campaign that would result in the deaths of hostages and soldiers. In an interview that aired on Thursday, Mr Netanyahu told Fox News's Bill Hemmer that the military intended to take control of all of Gaza. He said Israel did not want to keep the Gaza Strip, but to establish a 'security perimeter' and to hand over the territory to Arab forces. The announcement from the prime minister's office early yesterday said the military would take Gaza City, but did not say whether Israeli forces would take the entire enclave. Israel's cabinet is expected to endorse the Gaza City plan. Where should we go? Do we throw ourselves in the sea? Mr Netanyahu spoke with German chancellor Friedrich Merz yesterday to express disappointment over Berlin's suspension of weapons exports to Israel, the prime minister's office said. Mr Netanyahu told the chancellor that Israel's goal was to 'free Gaza from Hamas' so that a peaceful government could be established there, and that Israel does not intend to take it over, the office added. The military has said that it controls about 75pc of Gaza. Amir Avivi, a retired Israeli brigadier general, estimated that, if the military did take Gaza City, it would give Israel control of about 85pc of the Strip. 'Gaza City is the heart of Gaza. It's really the centre of government. It has always been the strongest and, even in the eyes of Hamas, the fall of Gaza City is pretty much the fall of Hamas,' he said. 'Taking over Gaza City is a game-changer.' Israeli media said 900,000 people now live in Gaza City, including many who have been displaced by the military. 'Where should we go? Do we throw ourselves in the sea?' said Maghzouza Saada, a displaced Palestinian from Gaza's north. There are 50 hostages still held in Gaza, 20 of whom Israeli officials believe are alive. Most of those freed so far were done so as a result of diplomatic negotiations. Talks towards a ceasefire that could have seen more hostages released collapsed last month. European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen was among foreign leaders urging Israel to reconsider its decision to advance into Gaza City. Regional power Saudi Arabia, which has said it could not normalise ties with Israel without the establishment of a Palestinian state, condemned any move to occupy Gaza. Opinion polls have shown that a majority of Israelis believe Netanyahu should end the war Asked in an interview with Reuters about criticism of Israel's plan, Mr Huckabee asked why some nations were 'once again' placing 'all the pressure on Israel' instead of on Hamas. Mr Huckabee said US president Donald Trump was frustrated that Hamas is unwilling to reach 'any kind of reasonable settlement', adding that the president insists that the militant group cannot remain in power and must disarm. Israel has already come under mounting pressure at home and abroad over the war in Gaza, including over the humanitarian disaster in the enclave. In recent weeks, Britain, Canada and France said they could recognise a Palestinian state at the UN General Assembly next month. Opinion polls have shown that a majority of Israelis believe he should end the war immediately in a diplomatic agreement that would see the release of remaining hostages.
