Defense Minister Israel Katz is mulling the reestablishment of Israeli settlements in Gaza in defiance of the US-brokered peace plan<\/p>\n
Israel \u201cwill never leave Gaza,\u201d Defense Minister Israel Katz said, mulling the idea of reestablishing illegal settlements in the Palestinian enclave. The remarks triggered widespread backlash, prompting Katz to backtrack on his assertion somewhat.
\nThe minister made the statement on Tuesday while participating in a ceremony to mark the opening of 1,200 new homes in the occupied West Bank\u2019s Beit El settlement. In his speech, Katz pledged to rebuild the settlements in northern Gaza that Israel abandoned back in 2005.
\n\u201cWe are deep inside Gaza, and we will never leave Gaza, there will be no such thing,\u201d he stated.
\n\u201cWhen the time comes, God willing, we will establish in northern Gaza Nahal outposts in place of the communities that were uprooted,\u201d Katz added.
\nThe minister was referring to a type of military-agricultural outpost established by the country\u2019s troops in both Israel and Israeli-occupied territories throughout the second half of the 20th century. The bulk of those outposts were ultimately converted into permanent civilian settlements.<\/p>\n
Read more<\/p>\n
Israel not invited: Can outside forces forge peace in Gaza?<\/p>\n
The defense minister\u2019s remarks are at odds with the policy voiced by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has repeatedly said West Jerusalem has no plans to resettle Gaza. His statements also collide with President Donald Trump\u2019s peace plan, which has induced the warring sides to enter a fragile truce. Upcoming phases of the US plan envision Israel withdrawing from the Palestinian enclave and explicitly state that \u201cIsrael will not occupy or annex Gaza.\u201d
\nThe minister\u2019s remarks have drawn criticism from various parties, who accuse Katz of making inflammatory statements at a \u201ccritical\u201d moment for the country\u2019s national security and spurning international partners.\u00a0 \u201cWhile the government votes with one hand in favor of the Trump plan, with the other hand it sells fables about isolated settlement nuclei in the Strip,\u201d former chief of staff Gadi Eisenkot wrote on X.
\nThe backlash has prompted Katz to walk back his remarks somewhat, with his office stating that \u201cthe government has no intention of establishing settlements in the Gaza Strip,\u201d asserting the comments were made \u201csolely in a security context.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Defense Minister Israel Katz is mulling the reestablishment of Israeli settlements in Gaza in defiance of the US-brokered peace plan Israel \u201cwill never leave Gaza,\u201d Defense Minister Israel Katz said,…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":24907,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":[],"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","footnotes":""},"categories":[4,6,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-24906","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-economy","category-environment","category-politics"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mongolianews.mn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24906","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mongolianews.mn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mongolianews.mn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mongolianews.mn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mongolianews.mn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=24906"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mongolianews.mn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24906\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mongolianews.mn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/24907"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mongolianews.mn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=24906"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mongolianews.mn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=24906"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mongolianews.mn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=24906"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}