By Andreea Popescu and Rami Ayyub
JERUSALEM, May 28 (Reuters) – Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Thursday he had directed Israel’s military to take more of Gaza, initially by seizing 70% of the Palestinian territory, where the population is already penned into a tiny strip of land along the coast.
Israel effectively controls an estimated 64% of the tiny coastal Strip, bombarded to ruins by Israel’s two-year military assault that followed the 2023 Hamas attack on southern Israel.
Under an October U.S.-brokered truce that has failed to halt Israeli attacks or secure Hamas’ disarmament, Israeli troops were meant to withdraw to a “Yellow Line” demarcating the extent of their control. Marked on military maps, that line put Israel in control of some 53% of Gaza, with Hamas ruling the rest.
Reuters has reported that Israel has unilaterally moved the concrete blocks marking the Yellow Line on the ground deeper into Hamas-controlled territory. Maps issued by the military in March showed an even bigger restricted area that analysts say cordons off around 64% of Gaza’s territory in total.
Netanyahu has repeatedly said in public remarks that the military controls more than 60% of Gaza. Speaking to a conference in a settlement in the occupied West Bank, the Israeli leader said even more of Gaza would be taken.
“We were at fifty, we moved to sixty. My directive is to move to – let’s go step by step,” Netanyahu said on Thursday.
“First of all, seventy. Let’s start with that. We’re pressing them (Hamas) from all sides. We’ll deal with the remnants.”
ISRAEL STEPS UP STRIKES IN GAZA DESPITE TRUCE
Netanyahu describes the territory Israel has seized in Gaza, Syria and Lebanon as “buffer zones” that can stave off potential militant attacks following the October 7, 2023 Hamas-led assault that set off the Gaza war.
Palestinians view Israel’s widening Gaza buffer zone as a part of a strategy to permanently displace them, pointing to remarks from senior ministers, including defense chief Israel Katz, saying they want to encourage “voluntary migration” from Gaza.
Netanyahu’s directive comes as Israel escalates its attacks in Gaza that it says target senior Hamas leaders who were involved in the 2023 attacks. On Tuesday, Israel killed Hamas’ armed wing chief, ten days after killing his predecessor.
Gaza health officials say an additional strike on Wednesday night that Israel said targeted two Hamas leaders had killed at least 10 people, including five children, and wounded 18 others.
That strike came as Palestinians were marking the Muslim holiday festival of Eid al-Adha, which many in Gaza celebrated by gathering together in tent encampments and in bombed-out buildings.
Etidal Al-Za’im said she was with her family inside their tent marking the holiday when suddenly rubble from the strike targeting the building next to them fell on top of them.
“We came out to the sound of a bang, we sat for an hour before we could come out through the (rubble) and find a way out of the tent,” she said.
Israeli strikes have killed more than 900 people since the truce, health officials say, while Israel says four soldiers were killed by militants during the same period. Israel and Hamas remain deadlocked in talks to advance a U.S. plan for Gaza that would see Israeli troops withdraw and Hamas disarm.
Another man who witnessed Wednesday’s Israeli strike, who identified himself as Abu Azam, said a “person in Gaza has no safety at all.”
“He could be hit in the street, he could be hit in the house, he could be hit in the hospital, he could be hit on his way to the market,” Abu Azam said.
(Additional reporting by Dawoud Abu Alkas and Bassam Masoud in Gaza; Editing by Sanjeev Miglani)
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