Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Sunday that he will not bow to international pressure to end the war in the Gaza Strip.
“No amount of international pressure will prevent us from achieving all the goals of the war: eliminating Hamas, freeing all our hostages and ensuring that Gaza no longer poses a threat to Israel,” Netanyahu said during a cabinet meeting, adding: “We must not bow to those pressures and we will not give in”.
The Israeli Prime Minister said that the pressure on Israel is focused on calling for new elections in Israel.
“They’re doing it by trying to get an election now, in the middle of a war. And they are doing this because they know that the current elections will stop the war and paralyze the country for at least six months,” Netanyahu said.
If they stop the war now, he added, before all its goals are achieved, it means that Israel has lost, and he will not allow that.
United States (U.S.) Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer criticized Netanyahu’s leadership on Thursday and called on Israel to hold new elections.
Netanyahu called Schumer’s comments “completely inappropriate.”
“You don’t do that to a sister democracy,” he added.
Despite international warnings, Netanyahu on Friday approved military plans for a ground operation in Rafah, where more than 1.4 million people have taken refuge from Israel’s war in the Gaza Strip.
Netanyahu has said he will carry out the operation in Rafah, which will take several weeks, but will happen.
“Those who say the operation in Rafah will not happen are the same ones who said we will not enter Gaza, we will not operate in Shifa, we will not operate in Khan Younis and we will not continue fighting after the ceasefire,” he added.
Israel launched attacks on the Gaza Strip after October 7th last year and a cross-border attack by Hamas, and since then at least 31,645 Palestinians, mostly women and children, have been killed and 73,676 injured.
On January 26th, following a genocide lawsuit filed by the Republic of South Africa, the International Court of Justice ruled that Israel must refrain from any actions related to the killing, attacks and destruction of the residents of the Gaza Strip and take all measures to prevent genocide.
