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“The war against terrorism is not just an Israeli one and it is not just in Gaza,” the Yesh Atid Party leader added.
By: Amelie Botbol
The Israel Defense Forces must retain the capacity to operate against Palestinian terrorists in the Gaza Strip even after the war against Hamas ends, opposition leader Yair Lapid told JNS on Monday.
“Israel will need to maintain the ability to act within Gaza even after the war ends, just as we do in the West Bank today. We have to remember that the war against terrorism is not just an Israeli one and it is not just in Gaza. The world needs to come together and act with force against terror wherever it appears,” said Lapid, who chairs the Yesh Atid Party.
“The most urgent thing now is to reach a deal that brings the hostages home. Then we need to create an alternative governance in Gaza that doesn’t include Hamas,” he added.
Less than two weeks after Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, massacre of some 1,200 people in southern Israel, Lapid said that the Palestinian Authority should be given control over Gaza after the war.
“I think in the end the best thing is that the Palestinian Authority goes back into Gaza,” Lapid said.
“It’s not ideal, and if you ask me what the [Israeli military’s] exit strategy should be, it should be helping the international community help [the P.A. return to power in Gaza],” he added.
In December 2023, Lapid seemingly changed tack, saying, “No one on earth thinks that Gaza should be handed over to Abu Mazen [P.A. leader Mahmoud Abbas] the day after the war. Not even one!
“I spoke about this with the American leadership, with the Europeans, with the people of [Benny Gantz’s] National Unity Party, with whoever you want,” he said.
In May of this year, Lapid urged the government to agree to discuss a Palestinian state as part of normalization talks with Saudi Arabia.
Prime Minister Benjamin “Netanyahu should announce that he has entered into negotiations with the Saudis, including the Palestinian component,” he told Army Radio.
“The Palestinian Authority should only partake in the civil component in Gaza,” Lapid said. “We need a model like Areas A and B [of Judea and Samaria]; the Israel Defense Forces enters and operates there whenever it wants.”
Netanyahu has repeatedly expressed his opposition to any role for the P.A. in a post-Hamas Gaza, telling the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Security Committee last year that the “Oslo [Accords] was the mother of all sins.”
“The difference between Hamas and the Palestinian Authority is only that Hamas wants to destroy us here and now, and the P.A. wants to do it in stages,” the prime minister said.
“We cooperate with them against Hamas when it serves their interest and ours up to a certain limit. We decided a few months ago that we don’t want them to collapse so that Hamas does not rise up in Judea and Samaria as well,” he added.
Lapid’s comments on Monday come amid reports that IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi recently approved the mobilization of additional troops to the Gaza Strip in a bid to increase pressure on Hamas to agree to a hostage deal.
The Lebanon truce and the collapse of Bashar Assad’s regime in Syria have enabled Israel to refocus its military effort on the Palestinian coastal enclave, Israel’s Channel 12 reported on Monday.
The IDF chief is expected to hold meetings this week in which military plans for Gaza will be put forward for his approval.
Energy Minister Eli Cohen told JNS on Monday, “Israel must maintain security control over Gaza to ensure that Hamas does not attempt to rebuild its strength and to prevent another attack like the one on October 7. This is essential for Israel’s security.
“Hamas has become a weakened organization, and its lack of response to the elimination of [terror chiefs] Yahya Sinwar and Mohammed Deif demonstrates this. However, the group still retains some limited capabilities, and we will continue to fight resolutely until we eradicate all of the terror organization’s military and governmental capacities,” he continued.
“The rocket fire underscores the necessity of maintaining security control in the Gaza Strip and thoroughly clearing every last inch of it from the terror nests that still remain,” Cohen said.
Barbarian enemy
Palestinian terrorists in the northern Gaza Strip fired five rockets on Sunday at Israeli communities in the “Gaza Envelope,” the area near the coastal enclave.
Two rockets were intercepted, according to the Israel Defense Forces, with the others apparently hitting open areas. There were no immediate reports of injuries.
The Israeli Air Force on Saturday downed two rockets launched by Palestinian terrorists in northern Gaza towards Jerusalem. The attacks triggered air-raid sirens in the capital, the Western Negev and the Judean Foothills (the Shfela). There were no reports of injuries.
“We are not doing enough. What we should do is engage in an actual war and not specific operations in specific points,” Likud MK Amit Halevy told JNS on Monday.
“We are dealing with a murderous, barbarian enemy and we need to defeat it, we need victory as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said, and total victory means taking over the Gaza Strip and eliminating all enemy forces,” he said.
Halevy said that after giving the population in the northern Gaza Strip the opportunity to move south of the Mefalsim Corridor to Gaza City, the IDF should impose an effective siege on cities such as Beit Hanon and Jabalia in northern Gaza.
“Anyone who is still in Jabalia and Beit Hanun is an enemy and defines himself as an enemy. We need to turn off the electricity and bomb all the energy sources. Everybody who is left behind is an enemy of the state, and that is according to the formal British army guide and international law. That’s what any other Western army would do and that’s what Israel should be doing,” Halevy said.
“The fact that we risk our soldiers is horrible. It makes the war last longer and is one of the biggest failures of our military leadership. I ask the minister of defense and other decision makers to change their way of thinking,” he continued.
Israeli forces killed 14 Hamas terrorists during recent operations in Jabalia and Beit Lahia, including six men who participated in the Oct. 7, 2023, massacre, the Israel Defense Forces and Israel Security Agency (Shin Bet) said on Sunday.
“The IDF and Shin Bet will continue to operate against every terrorist who participated in the brutal October 7 massacre,” the joint statement concluded.
(JNS.org)
