The intensive section of Israel’s warfare in opposition to Hamas is “about to finish,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu mentioned in a Sunday evening interview on Israeli tv, though he emphasised that didn’t imply the battle was coming to a detailed.
After the operation in Rafah, Gaza’s southernmost metropolis and the newest focus of Israel’s floor offensive, the prime minister mentioned, Israel would maintain “mowing the garden” — a time period lengthy utilized in Israeli safety circles to indicate using drive aimed toward curbing the regrowth of militant organizations.
Mr. Netanyahu’s remarks had been the newest suggestion by senior Israeli officers that the warfare might quickly enter a interval of change.
Israel’s protection minister, Yoav Gallant, was in Washington for conferences with Biden administration officers, which he mentioned would come with dialogue of “the transition to ‘Part C’ in Gaza.”
Whereas Israel’s navy says it’s near dismantling or significantly degrading Hamas’s navy infrastructure, the federal government has not proposed any clear plan for the administration of Gaza after the warfare.
Mr. Netanyahu steered within the interview {that a} postwar civilian administration would contain native Palestinians, hopefully with the assistance of reasonable Arab nations. The Israeli navy must preserve general safety management of the enclave, he mentioned.
The prime minister continued to rule out a proposal that has been pushed by the Biden administration: handing over Gaza to the Western-backed Palestinian Authority, which workouts restricted self-rule in elements of the occupied West Financial institution.
To get to the “day after Hamas,” Mr. Netanyahu mentioned, “first it’s important to remove Hamas” — reiterating his longstanding place that the armed group be absolutely eradicated, a aim that many consultants say is unattainable.
The prime minister’s remarks got here in a 44-minute interview he granted to “The Patriots,” a populist and infrequently divisive nightly speak present on Channel 14, a right-wing Israeli tv station that caters to Mr. Netanyahu’s voter base.
Mr. Netanyahu has not often been interviewed in Hebrew for an Israeli viewers for the reason that begin of the warfare. He has confronted criticism domestically for granting frequent interviews to American networks whereas participating with Israelis primarily via sporadic televised statements and information conferences or through video clips.
Mr. Netanyahu additionally addressed the stalled cease-fire negotiations through the interview, suggesting at one level that he was prepared to strike a “partial” deal for the return of solely a number of the 120 hostages being held in Gaza — an announcement that his workplace shortly walked again.
The prime minister mentioned he was able to comply with a brief truce and the discharge of a number of the hostages, then subsequently resuming the warfare. That proposition appeared to contradict an Israeli proposal that was authorised final month by Mr. Netanyahu and his warfare cupboard for a phased deal that will launch all of the hostages and usher in a everlasting cease-fire — a proposal that was endorsed by President Biden and the United Nations Safety Council.
However at one other level in Sunday’s interview, Mr. Netanyahu mentioned he was dedicated to bringing again all of the remaining hostages, not less than a 3rd of whom Israel has mentioned have died in captivity.
In a quick assertion issued after the interview, Mr. Netanyahu’s workplace mentioned it was Hamas that opposed a deal, not Israel, including: “Prime Minister Netanyahu has made it clear that we’ll not go away Gaza till we return all 120 of our hostages, residing and deceased.”
The Hostages and Lacking Individuals Households Discussion board, which advocates for the hostages, condemned Mr. Netanyahu’s feedback within the interview, saying that failing to advance the cease-fire proposal “abandons 120 hostages and violates the state’s ethical obligation to its residents.”
“The households of the hostages won’t permit the federal government and its chief to again away from their basic commitments to our family members’ destiny,” the group mentioned in an announcement. “The duty and obligation to return all hostages lies with the prime minister.”
Johnatan Reiss and Adam Rasgon contributed reporting.
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