Highlights
The United States has said that it does not support a reoccupation of Gaza after the Israeli invasion of the strip ends.
White House spokesperson John Kirby told the media that President Joe Biden does not consider “a reoccupation by Israeli forces of Gaza is not the right thing to do”.
However, Kirby also added that the status quo of October 6, the day before Hamas launched attacks against Israel, could not be restored and that things would have to be different.
The remarks come after Israeli Prime Minister benjamin Netanyahu said that his country would have to take ‘control’ of security in gaza to make sure that something like the Hamas attack never happens again.
He had added that the control would be extended for an ‘indefinite’ period.
Kirby also said that there needs to be a ‘healthy’ conversation about what Gaza would look like after the military operation ends and said the US government agrees with Israel that things cannot go to being like what they were before the Hamas attacks.
Following Netanyahu’s comment, Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant clarified that neither Hamas nor Israel would control the enclave.
Reports also said that Biden has been trying to get Netanyahu to pause the fighting for three days so the release of hostages can be negotitated.
Israel’s ground forces in the Gaza Strip aimed on Wednesday to locate and disable Hamas militants’ vast tunnel network beneath the enclave, the next phase in an Israeli offensive that has killed thousands of Palestinians.
Since Hamas gunmen killed 1,400 people and took some 240 hostages in an October 7 cross-border raid, Israel has pounded Gaza from the air and used ground troops to divide the coastal enclave in two.
Gaza City, Hamas’ main stronghold in the territory, is encircled. Israel says its troops have advanced to the heart of the densely-populated city while Hamas says its fighters have inflicted heavy losses on the invading forces.
Defence Minister Yoav Gallant said Israel had “one target - Hamas terrorists in Gaza, their infrastructure, their commanders, bunkers, communications rooms”.
Chief Israeli military spokesperson Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari said that Israel’s combat engineering corps were using explosive devices to destroy a tunnel network built by Hamas that stretches for hundreds of kilometres (miles) beneath Gaza.
Israeli tanks have faced heavy resistance from Hamas fighters using the tunnel network to launch ambushes, sources with Hamas and the separate Islamic Jihad militant group said.
It was not possible to verify the battlefield claims of either side.
