Netanyahu says hostage deal still possible, Rafah assault ‘has to be done’ to end war quickly
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday warned that Israel’s ground incursion into Rafah “has to be done” so that the war can end within “weeks.”
He added that a proposed six-week truce in the conflict in exchange for some Israeli hostages is still possible — so long as Hamas gives up its “delusional claims.”
Netanyahu told CBS’s “Face the Nation” that the Israel Defense Force will soon enter the Palesetinian city of Rafah, home to more than 1.4 million refugees, to eliminate some of the last remaining Hamas units.
“We’ve already destroyed 18 of the 24 Hamas terrorist battalions, so we have four of them [that] are concentrated in Rafah,” Netanyahu said. “We can’t leave the last Hamas stronghold without taking care of it. Obviously, we have to do it.
“It has to be done. Because total victory is our goal, and total victory is within reach,” the prime minister added. “Not months away, weeks away, once we begin the operation.”
Israel has received mounting pressure from the US and other global powers to hold off its Rafah incursion until a complete plan is in place to avoid more civilian casualties, given that the southern city is now the most densely populated enclave in Gaza.
“We don’t believe that an operation in Rafah should go forward unless there is a clear and executable plan for this and we haven’t seen a plan like that,” White House National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan told NBC’s “Meet the Press” on Sunday.
The death toll in Gaza is nearly at 30,000, according to the Hamas-run Ministry of Health, with the IDF estimating that it has killed about 12,000 terrorists.
Netanyahu said that he, too, wants to avoid unnecessary bloodshed, noting that the IDF will enact a plan to evacuate the refugees away from the southern border with Egypt to an area north of Rafah, where most of the fighting has concluded.
The prime minister assured Egypt that the evacuation and fighting in Rafah would not spill over into the nation, lest it upset the 46 years of peace between the two countries.
Netanyahu also stressed that Israel is mulling the latest cease-fire deal proposed by US, Egyptian and Qatari mediators that could see as many as 40 hostages released of the more than 130 still captive.
“If Hamas goes down from its delusional claims and brings them down to earth, then we’ll have the progress that we all want,” he said.
Unlike Hamas’s previous refusal to back down from its demands, the terror group has reportedly lowered the number of Palestinian prisoners it wants released in order to let the remaining hostages go and also is not asking for a complete withdrawal of IDF forces in Gaza.
Netanyahu reiterated that freeing the hostages remains its top goal, with its second objective being to destroy the terrorist organization and make sure the Palestinian enclave “does not pose a threat to Israel in the future.”
Israel estimates that there are about 134 hostages remaining in Gaza, with a fifth of them believed to have died during the Oct. 7 massacre and while in captivity.
