Gaza's future after the war is unclear. Israel's settler movement sees an opportunity
An aerial view of buildings destroyed by Israeli airstrikes at the Jabalya camp for Palestinian refugees in Gaza City on October 11. Yahya Hassouna/AFP/Getty Images
Israeli soldiers speak to the camera with rifles in hand and arms on their shoulders. Behind it lies the shell of a Gaza building.
“We are here to bring light after the Black Saturday that the people of Israel had,” says one of the men in the video circulating on Telegram. “We occupy, deport and settle. Occupy, deport and settle. Did you hear that, Bibi? Occupy, deport and settle.”
As Israel's war against Hamas enters its fourth month, the Israeli government has said little of substance, at least officially, about its plans for the postwar Gaza Strip.
Hamas took control of the territory, home to about 2.2 million Palestinians, from the Palestinian Authority in 2007, two years after Israel unilaterally withdrew all its troops and about 8,000 Jewish settlers. Who will govern it after Israel's war against Hamas ends is an open question.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu rejected the idea of establishing Jewish settlements, saying only that neither Hamas nor the Ramallah-based Palestinian Authority should govern the area and that Israel would retain “full security control.”
Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, a member of Netanyahu's right-wing Likud party, released his own proposal, saying there should be “no Israeli presence in Gaza,” but without providing details about what governance there would look like.
In this gap has emerged a group (once marginal but now part of the ruling coalition) hoping to take full control of Israel, resettle Gaza and even expel the Palestinians. And his ideas permeate the general debate.