Israel’s intensified operations in Gaza make it “increasingly difficult” to see how stated goals like the release of hostages or the disarmament of Hamas can be achieved, Merz said in a statement.
Spanish Foreign Minister José Manuel Albares said in a post on X: “We strongly condemn the Israeli government’s decision to escalate its military occupation of Gaza. It would only lead to further destruction and suffering.”
The Israeli plan includes disarming Hamas, returning all the hostages captured by Hamas on Oct. 7, 2023, the demilitarization of the Gaza Strip with Israeli security control in the area, and the establishment of an administration that is “neither Hamas nor the Palestinian Authority,” according to the Israeli government.
Ahead of the security cabinet’s meeting, Netanyahu was asked in a Fox News interview if Israel plans full take over of the Gaza Strip, which he confirmed. The plan as approved by the security cabinet, however, only mentions Gaza City.
“We intend to, in order to assure our security, remove Hamas there, enable the population to be free of Gaza, and to pass it to civilian governance,” Netanyahu said in the interview.
“We don’t want to keep it. We want to have a security perimeter. We want to hand it over to Arab forces that will govern it properly without threatening us and giving Gazans a good life,” he added.
Yair Lapid, Israel’s opposition leader and former prime minister, slammed the security cabinet’s decision as a “disaster that will lead to many more disasters” in a post on X.
“This is exactly what Hamas wanted: for Israel to be trapped in the field without a goal, without defining the picture of the day after, in a useless occupation that no one understands where it is leading,” Lapid wrote.
Chris Lunday contributed reporting.