Israel will keep control over Gaza indefinitely after its war against Hamas ends, Benjamin Netanyahu has stated, saying his country will take “overall security responsibility” for the territory.
One month after Hamas’s attack killed 1,400 people, the Israeli prime minister also said he would consider hour-long “tactical little pauses” in fighting to allow the entry of aid or the exit of hostages from the Gaza Strip, but again rejected calls for a ceasefire.
Asked who should “govern” Gaza after fighting ends, Netanyahu told ABC News in an interview broadcast on Monday night: “Those who don’t want to continue the way of Hamas.”
He added: “Israel will for an indefinite period … have the overall security responsibility [in Gaza] because we’ve seen what happens when we don’t have that security responsibility.”
His comments offered the clearest indication yet that Israel plans to keep a tight grip over the territory that is home to 2.3 million Palestinians.
The United Nations and other world bodies, including the EU, consider Gaza as occupied – despite Israel withdrawing its forces from inside the strip in 2005 – as it has maintained effective control over the small territory by land, sea and air.
Israel’s military re-entered Gaza last week and has encircled the densely populated Gaza City, where the Hamas Islamist group is hiding among civilians. The army said early on Tuesday that it had taken a Hamas compound and was poised to attack fighters hiding in underground tunnels.
Health officials in Gaza said at least 23 Palestinians were killed in two separate Israeli airstrikes early on Tuesday in southern Gaza – areas to where Israel has told civilians to flee.
In the city of Khan Younis, a man rescued from the rubble of a house where medics said 11 people had been killed warned that Israel would be “taught a very tough lesson”.
“This is the bravery of the so-called Israel, they show their might and power against civilians, babies inside, kids inside, and elderly,” the man told reporters.
On Tuesday, a month since Hamas’s attack in southern Israel, people held a minute of standing silence across Israel to commemorate the victims.
The night before, a vigil in Jerusalem was held, with a candle lit for each victim.
Relatives of the dead gathered at Jerusalem’s Western Wall where prayers were held marking the first month of grief, in line with Jewish tradition. “We don’t have other ways to commemorate them except with prayers, lighting candles, and having them in our heart,” Yossi Rivlin, whose two brothers were killed at a music festival massacre during the Hamas attack.
Standing before a giant Israeli flag, the army’s chief cantor, Shai Abramson, gave a prayer for the dead, modified to include a blessing for security forces personnel who had died.
Retaliating to the Hamas raid, in which fighters seized 240 hostages, Israel has bombarded the enclave in an assault that Gaza health officials say has killed more than 10,000 Palestinians, including about 4,100 children.
Both Israel and Hamas have rebuffed mounting calls for a halt in fighting. Israel says hostages should be released first. Hamas says it will neither free them nor stop fighting while Gaza is under assault.
Rights groups and UN experts have accused both Israel and Hamas of committing war crimes. The United Nations high commissioner for human rights, Volker Turk, began a five-day visit to the Middle East on Tuesday, although he had still not secured permission from Israel to visit.
“It has been one full month of carnage, of incessant suffering, bloodshed, destruction, outrage and despair,” Turk said in a statement. “Human rights violations are at the root of this escalation and human rights play a central role in finding a way out of this vortex of pain.”
The UN secretary general, António Guterres, has said Gaza is becoming a “graveyard for children”, calling for an urgent ceasefire.
International organisations have said Gaza’s hospitals cannot cope with the wounded, and food and clean water are running out with aid deliveries nowhere near enough. “We need an immediate humanitarian ceasefire. It’s been 30 days. Enough is enough. This must stop now,” said a statement from the heads of several United Nations bodies.
On Monday, the Israeli military released video of tanks moving through bombed-out streets and groups of troops moving on foot. It says it has surrounded Gaza City, cutting off northern parts of the narrow coastal strip from the south.
The UN security council met behind closed doors on Monday. The 15-member body is still trying to agree a resolution after failing four times in two weeks to take action. Diplomats said a key obstacle was whether to call for a ceasefire, cessation of hostilities or humanitarian pauses to allow aid access in Gaza.
When asked on Monday if there had been any talks at the UN yet about what might happen in Gaza once the fighting stopped, the deputy US ambassador to the UN, Robert Wood, told reporters: “Obviously there is concern about what happens the day after, but we’re not at that point.”
Reuters and Agence France-Presse contributed to this report
