Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz warned on Friday that Gaza City would face complete destruction if Hamas refused to disarm, release all hostages, and accept Israel’s conditions for ending the war.
Katz declared that Israel would unleash devastating force on Hamas unless the group agreed to surrender its weapons and free hostages, stressing that Gaza City would face the same fate as destroyed Rafah and Beit Hanoun.
The warning followed Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s announcement that he had ordered urgent negotiations for the release of hostages, which he said would run alongside Israel’s planned military operation to seize Gaza City.
Meanwhile, the UN has cautioned that expanding Israeli operations in Gaza would worsen the humanitarian crisis, with thousands of civilians already suffering from food shortages, displacement, and the destruction of basic infrastructure.
Mediators are awaiting Israel’s official response to a ceasefire deal Hamas accepted, which includes staggered hostage releases, while Israel insists on freeing all captives at once before halting military action.
The war, triggered by Hamas’s October 2023 attack that killed 1,219 people in Israel, has since claimed over 62,000 Palestinian lives in Gaza, most of them civilians, according to UN-verified figures.