Far-Right Minister Claims Gaza “Inseparable Part” of Israel, Calls for Its Occupation
Occupied Palestine (Quds News Network)- Bezalel Smotrich, Israel’s far-right Finance Minister, said Tuesday that Israel was “closer than ever” to occupying Gaza and rebuilding illegal settlements there.
Speaking at a conference for the anniversary of Israel’s withdrawal from Gaza in the summer of 2005, Smotrich claimed that the territory is “an inseparable part of the land of Israel.”
“It’s real,” he said of the idea of Israeli settlers’ returning to Gaza. “For 20 years we called it wishful thinking. It seems to me it is now a real working plan.”
“I don’t want to return to Gush Katif,” he said, referring to the group of 21 Israeli settlements in southern Gaza that were abandoned in 2005 as part of Israel’s so-called disengagement plan from Gaza.
“It’s too small and crowded,” he said, adding “it has to be much larger.”
He said the situation in Gaza today “allows for bigger thinking.”
His remarks came soon after the Netherlands announced it was barring him and another far-right government minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, from entering the country in an effort to pressure Israel into stopping the 21-month war that has devastated Gaza and killed thousands of civilians.
Both Smotrich and Ben-Gvir have called for the war to continue and threatened to quit the government if a ceasefire in Gaza is reached. They encourage the forcible displacement of Gaza’s population of two million Palestinians, a measure that international legal experts have said would amount to ethnic cleansing.
