Gantz Obstructs Nentayahu’s Move to Legalize Outposts

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Benny Gantz at the weekly cabinet meeting (File photo: AFP)
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Benny Gantz at the weekly cabinet meeting (File photo: AFP)
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Gantz Obstructs Nentayahu’s Move to Legalize Outposts

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Benny Gantz at the weekly cabinet meeting (File photo: AFP)
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Benny Gantz at the weekly cabinet meeting (File photo: AFP)

Israeli Alternate Prime Minister and Defense Minister Benny Gantz has blocked PM Benjamin Netanyahu's attempt to legalize the settlement outposts.

Gantz refused to include the proposal on the government’s agenda, saying that discussing such an important issue a day before the inauguration of US President Joe Biden is irresponsible.

Netanyahu tried to include the proposal on last week’s agenda, but Gantz requested a meeting for deliberation, which never happened.

Rather, Likud sources claimed that Gantz had agreed to the move, which he soon denied, compelling a number of settlers to accuse Netanyahu of hiding behind the minister.

Tuesday’s cabinet session discussed extending the lockdown measures to limit the spread of the coronavirus, but Netanyahu tried to include a proposal that would recognize the illegal communities.

He said 18,000 Jewish settlers living in the outposts are in tragic conditions, without water or electricity, stressing that their sites must be recognized as official settlements for humanitarian reasons.

Gantz rejected the proposal, saying it was “irresponsible”, and indicated that senior officials and experts of the justice and foreign ministries have voiced their opposition to the project to “legitimize outposts” for political and legal reasons.

Senior Justice Ministry officials said the transitional government is not entitled to take such decisions, warning of the impact they might have on the investigations of the International Criminal Court (ICC) against Israel on the issue of settlements.

In addition, the Palestinian Foreign Ministry announced that it would include the legalization of the outposts to its case against Israel.

The draft resolution aims to legalize 49 outposts of the unrecognized 110.

Last month, 20 representatives of groups protesting the delay in recognizing the outposts launched a sit-in before Netanyahu's office.

Two weeks ago, they began a hunger strike and Samaria Regional Council chairman Yossi Dagan was hospitalized after collapsing.

Dagan said earlier that Netanyahu is not serious about legalizing the outposts.

Observers believe Netanyahu was aware that Gantz would not allow the issue to be discussed in the government, yet he insisted on bringing it up to say that Gantz was the one against the decision.



Israeli Army Bombards Homes in North Gaza, Airstrike Kills 15, Medics Say

A Palestinian boy inspects the destruction at the site of an Israeli strike that targeted a home in the Bureij refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip on December 2, 2024, amid the ongoing war between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas group. (AFP)
A Palestinian boy inspects the destruction at the site of an Israeli strike that targeted a home in the Bureij refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip on December 2, 2024, amid the ongoing war between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas group. (AFP)
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Israeli Army Bombards Homes in North Gaza, Airstrike Kills 15, Medics Say

A Palestinian boy inspects the destruction at the site of an Israeli strike that targeted a home in the Bureij refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip on December 2, 2024, amid the ongoing war between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas group. (AFP)
A Palestinian boy inspects the destruction at the site of an Israeli strike that targeted a home in the Bureij refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip on December 2, 2024, amid the ongoing war between Israel and the Palestinian Hamas group. (AFP)

Israeli forces bombarded houses in overnight attacks in the northern Gaza Strip, killing at least 15 people in one of the buildings in the town of Beit Lahiya, Palestinian medics said on Monday.

Several others were wounded in the attack and others were missing after a house providing shelter to displaced people was struck, with rescue workers unable immediately to reach them, the Palestinian Civil Emergency Service said.

The three barely operational hospitals in the area were unable to cope with the number of wounded, they added.

Clusters of houses were bombed and some set ablaze in Jabalia and in Beit Lahiya and Beit Hanoun, where the Israeli army has been operating for several weeks, residents said.

They said Israeli drones had dropped bombs outside a school sheltering displaced families, suggesting this was intended to scare them into leaving.

The Palestinians say Israel's army is trying to clear people out of the northern edge of Gaza with forced evacuations and bombardments to create a buffer zone. The Israeli army denies this.

The Israeli military, which began its offensive against Hamas in Gaza after the group's attack on southern Israeli communities on Oct. 7, 2023, has said its latest operations in northern Gaza are meant to prevent militants regrouping and waging attacks from those areas.

Israel's military campaign in Gaza has killed more than 44,400 people and displaced most of the population, Gaza officials say. Vast swathes of the enclave lie in ruins.

About 1,200 people were killed and over 250 taken hostage in the Hamas attack on the October 2023 attack on Israel, according to Israeli tallies.

NEW CEASEFIRE PUSH

Israel agreed a ceasefire with the Lebanese armed group Hezbollah last week, but the conflict in Gaza has continued.

Officials in Cairo have hosted talks between Hamas and the rival Fatah group led by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on the possible establishment of a committee to run post-war Gaza.

Egypt has proposed that a committee made up of non-partisan technocrat figures, and supervised by Abbas's authority, should be ready to run Gaza straight after the war ends. Israel has said Hamas should have no role in governance.

An official close to the talks said progress had been made but no final deal had been reached. Israel's approval would be decisive in determining whether the committee could fulfill its role. Egyptian security officials have also held talks with Hamas on ways to reach a ceasefire with Israel.

A Palestinian official close to the mediation effort told Reuters Hamas stood by its condition that any agreement must bring an end to the war and involve an Israeli troop withdrawal out, but would show the flexibility needed to achieve that.

Israel has said the war will end only when Hamas no longer governs Gaza and poses no threat to Israelis.

Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar said on Sunday there was some indication of progress towards a hostage deal but that Israel's conditions for ending the war had not changed.

White House national security advisor Jake Sullivan said he thought the chances of a ceasefire and hostage deal were now more likely.