‘Tyranny’: Netanyahu vows Israel will take full control of Gaza
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has reportedly decided Israel will seek to take full control of the Gaza Strip.
Netanyahu’s office informed Israel Defense Forces Chief of General Staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir of the decision Monday. Zamir, according to The Jerusalem Post, was told, “If this does not suit you, then you should resign.”
Netanyahu said his government is “committing to free Gaza from the tyranny of these [Hamas] terrorists.”
“Many Gazans come to us, and they say: ‘Help us be free, help us be free of Hamas, of their terror, of their cruelty, of their tyranny.’ And that’s what we will do,” Netanyahu said in a video shared on the social media platform X on Monday.
Hamas responded to the news, according to The Jerusalem Post, stating, “Israel’s threats are repetitive, worthless, and have no influence on our decisions.”
“While it is currently unclear exactly what the government intends,” according to Daniel Flesch, a senior policy analyst in the Allison Center for National Security at The Heritage Foundation, “the message to Hamas is clear: We intend to take from you the one thing you value most—territory.”
“Perhaps the realization that the war it began on Oct. 7, 2023, will end not with an expansion of Palestinian-controlled territory, but a diminution of it, will compel the terror organization to release the hostages it is currently starving and end the war,” Flesch told The Daily Signal.
The news of Netanyahu’s plan for Israel to take control of the Gaza Strip comes a little over a week after negotiations for a ceasefire and hostage deal between Israel and Hamas broke down again. Hamas has said it will not reengage in negotiations until the humanitarian situation improves in Gaza.
“The time has come to end the war Hamas started more than 20 months ago and alleviate the human misery in Gaza. By any reasonable metric, Hamas has lost this war, and since they have refused repeated offers to exchange the hostages for a ceasefire, the recent videos of their torment have forced the prime minister’s hand,” Victoria Coates, vice president of the Davis Institute for National Security and Foreign Policy at The Heritage Foundation, told The Daily Signal.
“There is no more time to spare,” Coates said, “and the only ones to blame for what is to come is Hamas and their enablers in Tehran,” a reference to the Islamic theocracy in Iran.
Since Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, terrorist attack on Israel, 50 hostages remain in Gaza, 20 of whom are thought to still be alive.
Hamas released two hostage propaganda videos in recent days, one of Rom Braslavski and another of Evyatar David.
Braslavski says he cannot walk and pleads for food and water in the video, his body appearing frail and malnourished.
David, looking equally frail, speaks to the camera in his hostage video as he digs a hole in a tunnel, saying he has not “eaten for a few days in a row,” adding, “[This] is the grave I think I’m going to be buried in.”
[Editor’s note: This story originally was published by The Daily Signal.]