Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has admitted that Israel currently controls 60 percent of the Gaza Strip and has signaled plans to expand this control to 70 percent, reports Anadolu.

“We currently control 60 percent of the Gaza Strip and my instructions are to move towards controlling 70 percent,” Netanyahu said during a seminar in the Jordan Valley.

According to the Israeli broadcaster Channel. 12, he did not provide details on how these plans would be implemented.

In October of last year, the Israeli army announced that it controlled 53 percent of the Gaza Strip after repositioning on the so-called “yellow line” under the first phase of US President Donald Trump’s plan to end the war in Gaza.

The agreement provided for further Israeli withdrawals as part of the second phase, which began in January. The “yellow line” refers to a temporary separation zone in eastern Gaza that separates areas under Israeli military control from areas where Palestinians are allowed to stay.

But Palestinian sources say the border has been steadily pushed westward in recent months.

Bassem Naim, a senior Hamas official, told Anadolu that Israel has moved the line an additional 8 percent to 9 percent inside Gaza territory, making bringing the area under Israeli control to more than 60 percent.

This change has reduced the space available to Palestinians to about 38 percent of the enclave, further exacerbating the severe humanitarian crisis.

Israel launched a genocidal war on Gaza in October 2023, killing more than 72,000 Palestinians and injuring over 172,000 others, most of them women and children.

Source: prizrenpost