Israel to ‘seize more ground’ and warns Hamas it will annex parts of Gaza

 

Israel to ‘seize more ground’ and warns Hamas it will annex parts of Gaza

 

Defence minister, Israel Katz, threatens to implement Trump’s plan to turn Gaza into resort if hostages not released

 

Lorenzo Tondo and Jason Burke in Jerusalem

Fri 21 Mar 2025 11.05 EDT

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/mar/21/israel-katz-warns-hamas-gaza-annex-war

 

Israel’s defence minister said on Friday he has instructed the military to “seize more ground” in Gaza and threatened to annex part of the territory unless Hamas releases the remaining hostages it holds.

 

Israel Katz’s warning came as the army stepped up the renewed assault it launched on Tuesday, shattering the truce that had facilitated the release of more than two dozen hostages and brought relative calm since late January.

 

After retaking part of the strategic Netzarim corridor that divides Gaza’s north from south, Israeli troops moved on Thursday towards the northern town of Beit Lahiya and the southern border city of Rafah. The military said it had resumed enforcing a blockade on northern Gaza, including Gaza City.

 

“I ordered [the army] to seize more territory in Gaza,” Katz said. “The more Hamas refuses to free the hostages, the more territory it will lose, which will be annexed by Israel.”

 

Katz also threatened “to expand buffer zones around Gaza to protect Israeli civilian population areas and soldiers by implementing a permanent Israeli occupation of the area,” should Hamas not comply.

 

He said the army “will intensify the fight with aerial, naval and ground shelling as well as by expanding the ground operation”, which he said would include implementing Donald Trump’s proposal to turn Gaza into a resort after the relocation of its Palestinian inhabitants to other Arab countries.

 

Early in February, the US president vowed to “take over” war-ravaged Gaza and “own it”, claiming that it could become the “Riviera of the Middle East”.

 

The Trump administration reiterated this week its support for Israel, which resumed intensive bombing of Gaza on Tuesday, with White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt saying, “The president made it very clear to Hamas that if they did not release all of the hostages there would be all hell to pay.”

 

Gaza’s civil defence agency said on Thursday that 504 people had been killed since the bombardment resumed, one of the highest tolls since the war began more than 17 months ago with Hamas’s attack on Israel.

 

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said the new strikes were against “terrorist” targets including a “Hamas military site in northern Gaza where preparations were being made to fire projectiles” and “several vessels in the coastal area of the Gaza Strip … intended for use in terrorist operations by Hamas and the Islamic Jihad [armed group]”.

 

The ceasefire was supposed to continue as long as talks on a second phase continued, but Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu balked at entering substantive negotiations. Instead, he tried to force Hamas to accept a new ceasefire plan put forth by US Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff.

 

.That plan would have required Hamas to release half its remaining hostages — the militant group’s main bargaining chip — in exchange for a ceasefire extension and a promise to negotiate a lasting truce. Israel made no mention of releasing more Palestinian prisoners — a key component of the first phase. Hamas has rejected the Witkoff plans as an attempt to renegotiate the original deal.

 

Netanyahu said that the strikes were “only the beginning” and that future negotiations with Hamas “will take place only under fire”.

 

“Hamas has already felt the strength of our arm in the past 24 hours. And I want to promise you – and them – this is only the beginning,” the Israeli prime minister said in a video statement.

 

Israel and Hamas accuse each other of breaching the truce, which had broadly held since January and offered respite for the 2.3 million inhabitants of Gaza.

 

Israel had already cut off the supply of food, fuel and humanitarian aid to the strip. The UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees, one of the largest providers of food aid in Gaza, warned on Friday it only had enough flour to distribute for the next six days.

 

“We can stretch that by giving people less, but we are talking days, not weeks,” Unrwa official Sam Rose told reporters in Geneva in an online briefing from central Gaza, reports Reuters.

 

About 1,200 people, mostly civilians, died in the shock Hamas incursion into Israel in October 2023 that triggered the war. The Israeli offensive in Gaza has killed more than 49,000, also mostly civilians.

 

AFP, Reuters and Associated Press contributed to this report