TEL AVIV: Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed to “demolish Hamas” as 300,000 Israeli troops massed on the border of the Gaza Strip ahead of an expected ground invasion to find and attack Hamas militants.
The Israeli leader for the first time convened his emergency war Cabinet, including opposition lawmaker Benny Gantz, in what Netanyahu said was a show of national unity.
Meeting at the military headquarters in Tel Aviv, Netanyahu said all the Israeli leaders were “working around the clock, with a united front.”
The ministers stood for a moment’s silence in memory of 1,300 Israelis who were killed in Hamas’s shock attack Oct. 7. Israel, in turn, has launched hundreds of airstrikes and missile attacks on Gaza and killed about 1,900 Palestinians.
“Hamas thought we would be demolished,” Netanyahu said. “It is we who will demolish Hamas.” He said the show of political unity “sends a clear message to the nation, the enemy and the world.”
The Israeli leaders met as the U.S. State Department said Secretary of State Antony Blinken would return to Israel Monday for further discussions after visiting the Jewish state last week. The top U.S. diplomat has made seven stops in Middle Eastern countries in recent days, including Egypt on Sunday, to work with Arab allies to prevent the Israel-Hamas war from spiraling out of control.
Israeli officials continued Sunday to demand that people living in the northern half of Gaza leave to the southern half of the narrow strip of land along the Mediterranean Sea, creating a chaotic caravan of cars and parents, with children in hand, walking with their life’s belongings to an uncertain future.
An Israel Defense Forces spokesman, Lieutenant Colonel Jonathan Conricus, said, “We want people to go south.”
(VOA)
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