Israel will maintain security control over Gaza even after current war, says Netanyahu

Israel will have ‘security responsibility’ over Gaza for an ‘indefinite period’ after the current war, Israel’s prime minister tells ABC.

By World Israel News Staff

In an interview Monday evening with David Miur on ABC’s “World News Tonight”, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reiterated his refusal to consider a ceasefire without the release of hostages, and emphasized that Israel will maintain control over the Gaza Strip in the aftermath of the war to ensure the safety of Israelis.

“We have seen what happens when Israel does not have the security responsibility. When we do not have this security responsibility what we have is an eruption of Hamas terror on a scale we could not imagine.”

Many solutions have been proposed on how to deal with Gaza after the war, from peacekeeping forces that include U.S. troops to placing the area completely under United Nations oversight, to returning Gaza to Palestinian Authority control, to the transfer of the area’s Arab population and Israeli annexation.

Netanyahu emphasized the need to entrust Israel with full “security responsibility” as the surest way to prevent future attacks similar to the October 7th massacre. The Israeli premier added that the IDF will have to control Gaza for an “indefinite period.”

“Those who don’t want to continue the way of Hamas,” Netanyahu continued. “It certainly is not — I think Israel will, for an indefinite period will have the overall security responsibility because we’ve seen what happens when we don’t have it. When we don’t have that security responsibility, what we have is the eruption of Hamas terror on a scale that we couldn’t imagine.”

“There’ll be no cease-fire, general cease-fire, in Gaza without the release of our hostages,” Netanyahu told David Miur. “As far as tactical little pauses, an hour here, an hour there. We’ve had them before, I suppose, will check the circumstances in order to enable goods, humanitarian goods to come in, or our hostages, individual hostages to leave. But I don’t think there’s going to be a general cease-fire.”

The Prime Minister’s concern with humanitarian pauses is that it would delay the IDF’s crucial operations, including recovering hostages, and would slacken the necessary pressure required to defeat Hamas.

“The only thing that works on these criminals in Hamas is the military pressure that we are exerting.”