Israel to have overall security responsibility over Gaza

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said that his country will have “overall security responsibility” over the Gaza Strip “for an indefinite period” after the war against Hamas ends.

“I think Israel for an indefinite period will have the overall security responsibility because we’ve seen what happens when we don’t have it. When we don’t have that security responsibility, what we have is the eruption of Hamas terror on a scale that we couldn’t imagine,” he told a media outlet.

The stance has been uttered by Israeli officials in recent weeks on condition of anonymity, but Netanyahu now put the stance on the table himself.

It was not clear what Netanyahu had in mind regarding the extent of security responsibility, but Israeli officials have insisted that they don’t desire to occupy Gaza after the war.

US president Joe Biden expressed has voiced its opposition to that scenario as well, while warning Jerusalem that it is more likely to find itself bogged down in Gaza if it doesn’t start drawing up a plan for who will govern the enclave if it succeeds in removing Hamas from power.

It follows comments by other Israeli officials who have said that Israel will need to maintain a military presence inside Gaza in order to serve as a buffer protecting Israeli civilians.

Meanwhile US Vice President Kamala Harris held phone calls earlier this evening with UAE President Mohamed bin Zayed and Bahrain Prime Minister Salman bin Hamad to discuss the Israel-Hamas war, as the Biden administration worked to expand her role on the issue in recent weeks.

The White House readouts from both calls are largely identical and include the same talking points that Washington has been reiterating since the start of the war one month ago.

In both calls Harris stressed the administration’s commitment to increasing humanitarian aid for Gaza, protecting civilian lives as Israel advances in its war against Hamas, rejecting calls from some in Israel to forcibly displace Palestinians and working toward a two-state solution.

In the call Harris discussed “the importance of deterring threats from any state or non-state actor, especially those seeking to expand the conflict, and the Vice President condemned recent attacks by Iranian-backed militias across the region,” the White House said.