Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reaffirmed his opposition to “Palestinian sovereignty” in Gaza, saying that Israel must maintain “security control” of the territory where fierce fighting continues on Saturday at 106e day of war against Hamas.
Israel must “ensure that Gaza no longer poses a threat” and this requirement “contradicts the demand for Palestinian sovereignty”, explained Mr. Netanyahu during a telephone interview on Friday with US President Joe Biden, according to the Prime Minister’s office. minister.
On Thursday, Mr. Netanyahu had already affirmed that Israel must control the security of “the entire territory west of the Jordan”, including the occupied West Bank and Gaza.
The conflict, triggered by an unprecedented Hamas attack in southern Israel on October 7, is testing Israel’s relations with its main American ally and supporter, particularly on the issue, central to the post-war period. -war, of a “two-state” solution.
“Illusion”
Joe Biden “still believes in the prospect and the possibility” of a Palestinian state, but “recognizes that it will take a lot of work to get there,” the White House indicated after the telephone exchange.
“The illusion that Biden is preaching for a state of Palestine […] do not fool our people,” Hamas, classified as a terrorist organization by Israel, the United States and the European Union, responded on Saturday.
The bloody attack orchestrated on October 7 by the Islamist movement resulted in the death of 1,140 people, the majority civilians, according to an AFP count based on official Israeli figures. Some 250 people were kidnapped and taken to Gaza, with around 100 released at the end of November.
Israel, which has sworn to “annihilate” Hamas, is shelling in retaliation the small territory where 24,927 people, the vast majority women, children and adolescents, were killed by bombings and military operations, according to a report on Saturday from Hamas Ministry of Health.
Mr. Netanyahu has remained deaf to calls from the UN and the international community for a humanitarian ceasefire, while Washington has called on Israel to limit the number of civilian casualties.
Hostage leaflets
An AFP correspondent reported intense artillery fire and air strikes on Saturday, particularly in the Khan Younes sector in the south, now the epicenter of military operations.
Israeli forces said they had destroyed “terrorist infrastructure” in the territory and struck rocket launchers in Khan Yunis.
Hamas, in power in Gaza since 2007, has also reported fierce fighting in the north of the besieged and devastated territory.
On Saturday, leaflets showing photos of the hostages and calling on residents to share any information about them were dropped by the Israeli army on the town of Rafah, on the border with Egypt, where tens of thousands of displaced people are crowded together. .
According to Israel, 132 hostages are still in the territory. At least 27 were killed, according to an AFP count based on Israeli figures.
The World Health Organization (WHO) deplored “inhumane living conditions” in the territory, whose 2.4 million inhabitants lack everything. According to the UN agency responsible for humanitarian coordination (OCHA), 375,000 people are threatened with “severe malnutrition”.
At least 1.7 million people have been displaced by the war in Gaza, according to revised figures from the UN Palestinian Refugee Agency (UNRWA).
In the occupied West Bank, scene of an escalation of violence on the sidelines of the war in Gaza, Palestinians gathered on Saturday for the funeral of a teenager killed the day before by Israeli fire near Ramallah. Tawfiq Ajaq, 17, who according to his father had an American passport, was “suspected of throwing stones”, according to the Israeli army.
Raid on Damascus
Entering its fourth month, the conflict is exacerbating tensions between Israel and the “axis of resistance”, bringing together anti-Israeli groups around Iran such as Hamas, Lebanese Hezbollah, the Yemeni Houthis and Iraqi groups, raising fears of a regional conflagration.
At least five Iranian soldiers were killed Saturday in an Israeli strike on a building in Damascus, announced the Revolutionary Guards, Tehran’s ideological army. According to Iranian media, the attack notably targeted the head of the Guardians’ intelligence in Syria and his deputy.
Asked by AFP, the Israeli army refused to comment.
On the Israeli-Lebanese border, another hot spot, the Israeli army bombed Hezbollah sites in southern Lebanon, after attacks by the Lebanese movement against Israeli territory.
In Iraq, several dozen missiles were fired on Saturday in the west against a base housing American soldiers and other troops of the international anti-jihadist coalition, Iraqi police and American military officials told AFP.
The Pentagon also announced on Saturday that it had “destroyed” a Houthi anti-ship missile, in new strikes described as “self-defense” against these Yemeni rebels who are carrying out repeated attacks against merchant ships in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden .