Israel Cabinet approves Gaza takeover plan

Israel Security Cabinet has approved a plan to take over Gaza City, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said.

The decision taken early Friday marks another escalation of Israel’s 22-month offensive launched in response to Hamas’ October 7 attack.

The war has already killed tens of thousands of Palestinians, destroyed much of Gaza and pushed the territory of some 2 million Palestinians toward famine.

Ahead of the Security Cabinet meeting, which began Thursday and ran through the night, Netanyahu had said Israel planned to retake control over the entire territory and eventually hand it off to friendly Arab forces opposed to Hamas.

Asked in an interview with Fox News ahead of the Security Cabinet meeting if Israel would “take control of all of Gaza,” Netanyahu replied, “We intend to, in order to assure our security, remove Hamas there, enable the population to be free of Gaza.”

“We don’t want to keep it. We want to have a security perimeter,” Netanyahu said in the interview. “We want to hand it over to Arab forces that will govern it properly without threatening us and giving Gazans a good life.”

Hamas-led militants abducted 251 people and killed around 1,200 in the October 7, 2023, attack that triggered the war.

Most of the hostages have been released in ceasefires or other deals but 50 remain inside Gaza, around 20 of them believed by Israel to be alive.