Benjamin Netanyahu says Israel will “complete Hamas defeat” in final Gaza offensive

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has claimed Israel has no choice but to ‘finish the job and complete the defeat of Hamas’ in a final military takeover of Gaza.

He was speaking to foreign media in Jerusalem and defending a planned military offensive, but claimed the goal wasn’t to ‘occupy’ Gaza, but to free it.

Netanyahu also slammed what he calls a ‘global campaign of lies’ as condemnation of the plan grows both inside and outside Israel.

He explained he hopes to demilitarise Gaza, allowing the Israeli military to have ‘security control’ over the enclave.

The prime minister also said he had directed Israel’s military in recent days to ‘bring in more foreign journalists’ after previously banning them from entering Gaza.

Netanyahu’s worrying remarks come on the same day that at least 26 Palestinians were killed while seeking aid in Gaza, hospitals and witnesses said.

Today, families of Israeli hostages also called for a general strike to protest against plans to expand military operations in the territory.

Hospital officials said they received bodies from areas where Palestinians were seeking aid, either along food convoy routes or near privately run aid distribution points across Gaza.

The dead include 10 who were killed while waiting for aid trucks close to the newly built Morag corridor, which separates the southern cities of Rafah and Khan Younis, said Nasser hospital.

A further six people were killed while waiting for aid in northern Gaza near the Zikim crossing. In central Gaza, witnesses said they first heard warning shots before the fire was aimed toward crowds of aid seekers trying to reach a food distribution site.

Israel’s air and ground offensive has displaced most of the population and pushed the territory into a famine.

Two more Palestinian children died of malnutrition-related causes on Saturday, bringing the death toll among children in Gaza to 100 since the war began.

A total of 117 adults have died of malnutrition-related causes since late June, when the ministry started to count this age category, it said.

The toll from hunger is not included in the ministry’s death toll of 61,400 Palestinians in the war.

As the war prepares to enter its third year in October, more and more people are speaking out about the brutality in Gaza.

Liverpool forward Mohamed Salah called out UEFA for not saying how a footballer known as the ‘Palestinian Pele’ died in its tribute to him.

The Palestinian Football Association (PFA) said on Wednesday that Suleiman Al-Obeid, 41, died in an Israeli attack in Gaza.

In an X post, the European football association UEFA said he was ‘a talent who gave hope to countless children, even in the darkest of times’.

Responding to this, Egyptian star Salah said: ‘Can you tell us how he died, where, and why?’