Netanyahu says Israel will enter Rafah in southern Gaza ‘with or without’ hostage deal
UPI
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Tuesday made it clear that an invasion of the southern Gaza city of Rafah will go forward independent of negotiations to free hostages held by the terrorist group Hamas.
Netanyahu said that Israeli forces would enter Rafah and “eliminate the Hamas battalions there,” adding that the plan would move forward “with or without a deal, in order to achieve the total victory.”
“The idea that we will halt the war before achieving all of its goals is out of the question,” Netanyahu said Tuesday during talks with right-wing affiliated groups that represent families of the Hamas hostages and those of fallen Israeli soldiers and support Israel’s military effort in Gaza.
Netanyahu’s comments came as U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken is in the Middle East for another round of talks with leaders and other officials
Blinken had warned against a Rafah incursion as American officials indicated on Monday that progress had been made on a possible deal to free the remaining hostages of the 254 kidnapped during Hamas’ Oct. 7 sneak attack on Israel.
U.S. President Joe Biden and Netanyahu spoke on the phone on Sunday in a conversation in which Biden “reiterated his clear position” on an invasion of Rafah, which the United States in the past has called a “red line.”
According to the Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry, more than 34,000 people have died in Gaza since the start of the war on Oct. 7, although the exact numbers have been hard to pin down.
On Monday, a State Department spokesperson said the United
States had recently determined that five Israeli military units had committed gross violations of human rights long before the start of the Israel-Hamas war.
Any new hostage deal would be likely to include at least a temporary cease-fire and halt of Israel’s plans to enter Rafah, where more than half of Gaza’s 2.5 million civilians have sought refuge from the fighting.
In March, the United Nations’ highest technical body for assessing food and nutrition crises warned of an “imminent famine” in Gaza.
Also on Monday, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas warned that an Israeli invasion of Rafah would be “the greatest disaster in the history of the Palestinian people.”
Netanyahu has maintained that taking control of Rafah and destroying the remaining Gazan resistance battalions is paramount to taking control of the region and defeating Hamas, which he has vowed to do since Oct.
7.
Palestinians and the international community have continued to counter that such a move would cause a humanitarian catastrophe.
The Palestinian leader said there “must be a political solution that brings together Gaza, the West Bank, and Jerusalem into an independent Palestinian state,” adding that he feared that after Gaza, “Israel will turn to the West Bank to deport its people towards Jordan.”
But on Tuesday, a few far-right members of Netanyahu’s war coalition government said they were taking steps to pressure the prime minister to proceed with the Rafah invasion in southern Gaza despite any “reckless” hostage deal, saying Netanyhu “understands what the significance is if these things do not happen.”