Gallant swears the war will only end when Hamas is destroyed; IDF advances further in Rafah

Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said Sunday that Israel was working to find a replacement for Hamas’ rule in the Gaza Strip, vowing that the war would not end until the terror group dismantled its military capabilities and governmental.

“In any process to end the war, we will not accept Hamas rule. We are proposing an alternative government to Hamas, where we will isolate areas, eliminate Hamas members and bring in other forces that will enable a different government,” Gallant said after an assessment at the Southern Command in Beersheba.

“On the one hand, military action and, on the other hand, the ability to change the regime (in Gaza), will lead to the achievement of two of the objectives of this war: the dismantling of the Hamas government and its power military, and the return of the hostages,” he added.

Gallant’s comments come after US President Joe Biden on Friday outlined what he described as Israel’s latest proposal for a hostage deal and ceasefire to end the war in Gaza. The US president’s speech triggered shock waves within the Israeli government, where far-right parties threatened to bring down the coalition if Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu tried to get it approved.

The war cabinet was due to meet Sunday evening to discuss the proposal and its possible implementation, given international and domestic pressure to accept the deal to secure the release of the 121 hostages believed to be held by Hamas in Gaza since their kidnapping on October 7.

Despite Netanyahu’s insistence that there will be no permanent ceasefire in Gaza until Hamas’s military and government capabilities are destroyed, the leaders of the government’s two ultranationalist parties, the Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich of Religious Zionism and National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir of Otzma Yehudit both threatened Saturday evening to bring down the government if the new agreement is adopted.

War Minister Benny Gantz also issued an ultimatum to Netanyahu, demanding last month that the prime minister commit to an agreed vision of the Gaza conflict, which would include defining who could rule the territory after defeat. of Hamas, and warning that it would lock in the conflict. coalition if this does not happen by June 8.

The deliberations took place as the Israel Defense Forces continued their campaign to eliminate Hamas in Rafah, Gaza’s southernmost town. The Israeli military said on Sunday that its troops had recently begun operating in the Yabna camp in central Rafah, next to the border with Egypt.

Givati ​​Brigade troops killed several terrorists and located military infrastructure during recent operations in the region, the Israeli military said, adding that soldiers also located numerous weapons, including anti-aircraft machine guns .

Troops from the 9th Armored Battalion, operating under the leadership of the Givati ​​Brigade in the region, located several rocket launch sites on the Gaza-Egypt border.

Givati ​​Brigade troops operate in Rafah, southern Gaza, in a photo released June 2, 2024. (Israel Defense Force)

Israeli warplanes struck more than 30 targets across Gaza over the past day, according to an IDF update Sunday morning. Targets included Hamas infrastructure, weapons depots and armed men’s cells.

Nahal Brigade troops in Rafah also carried out an airstrike against a rocket launcher, moments after it was used to attack troops in the area. There were no injuries during the rocket attack.

The Israeli military has released images of rocket launchers and a weapons depot discovered by Nahal Brigade troops in Rafah in recent days. Troops used a small drone to scan a suspicious building, where several barrels filled with explosives were located, according to the military.

Over the weekend, the IDF announced the names of a number of “prominent” Hamas members who were killed in airstrikes in the Gaza Strip in recent days.

On Thursday, warplanes struck Nuseirat in central Gaza, killing Mansour Adil Mansour Kashlan, who the IDF said was involved in advancing terrorist attacks in Israel and the West Bank.

“The terrorist… advanced and carried out terrorist activities, and also engaged in coordination and cooperation with terrorist groups in the Gaza Strip and other countries,” the army said.

An IDF tank takes up position in an area of ​​Israel’s southern border with the Gaza Strip, June 2, 2024. (Menahem Kahana/AFP)

In another strike last week in central Gaza, carried out by a drone, Walid Abed Abu Dalal was killed. The Israeli military said Abu Dalal served in the terrorist group’s military wing, alongside his role as head of the technology department of Hamas’ internal security forces.

The military noted that Hamas’s internal security forces, and particularly its technology department, “harm the IDF’s freedom of action in the Gaza Strip and also constitute an important part of Hamas’ counterintelligence attempts.” “.

In another strike on Friday, also in Nuseirat, Tareq Darwish was killed. According to the Israeli military, Darwish was a senior member of the Nuseirat Battalion’s air network. The army said he was killed following attempts last month to “impede the IDF’s freedom of aerial action” in Gaza.

The Israeli army released images of this latest strike.

בפעdustrie דום פעblie ובייחוד במרחבי יהודה ושומרון >> pic.twitter.com/r8coSCgN9G

— צבא ההגנה לישראל (@idfonline) June 1, 2024

In another strike last week, the IDF said it killed Salame Baraka, a member of Hamas’ East Khan Younis battalion who was also head of the terrorist group’s police finance department.

The army said it also targeted a building belonging to the Al-Noor organization in Gaza City last week. According to the IDF, Al-Noor is classified as a terrorist group, due to its financing of Hamas.

The military said Al-Noor transferred millions of dollars to Hamas for terrorist activities in the West Bank, as well as distributing funds to the families of Hamas members killed or imprisoned by Israel.

The attack on the organization’s building in the Daraj and Tuffah neighborhoods of Gaza City took place on Thursday.

IDF troops operate in the Gaza Strip, in a photo approved for publication on June 2, 2024. (Israel Defense Forces)

Also in Gaza City, the IDF said it launched a new targeted raid last week against Hamas in the Sabra neighborhood, led by the Multi-Domain, or Shadow Unit, alongside the Carmeli and Yiftah reserve brigades, under the 99th Division.

Troops from the elite Ghost unit, alongside other forces, killed dozens of gunmen and demolished a weapons depot in Sabra over the past two days, the Israeli military said, adding that troopers also located weapons and numerous tunnel shafts during sweeps of the area.

The Israeli army first operated in the Sabra neighborhood at the start of the ground offensive last year, after Hamas sparked the war with its October 7 massacre, which saw some 3,000 terrorists cross the Israeli border by land, air and sea, killing around 1,200 people. people and captured 252 hostages, mostly civilians, many amid acts of brutality and sexual assault.

IDF troops operate in the Gaza Strip, in a photo approved for publication on June 2, 2024. (Israel Defense Forces)

Talks on reopening Rafah crossing

Separately, a meeting between American, Egyptian and Israeli officials was planned for Sunday in Cairo to discuss the reopening of the Rafah crossing in Gaza, according to a high-level source cited by Egyptian state-linked Al Qahera television.

Egypt is insisting that Israel withdraw its forces from the crossing, according to Al Qahera, after the IDF seized the Palestinian side of the crossing in May.

Meanwhile, in a weekly humanitarian aid summary, the IDF said on Sunday that 1,858 trucks carrying humanitarian aid had entered the Gaza Strip after being inspected by Israeli authorities.

He said the trucks – carrying food, water, medical equipment and shelter – entered Gaza via the Kerem Shalom crossing in the south of the strip and the West Erez crossing in the north of the territory. .

These figures include 764 trucks from Egypt, according to the Israeli army. Egypt briefly halted humanitarian aid deliveries after the IDF took control of the Rafah crossing last month, before agreeing, in coordination with the United States, to resume deliveries through Kerem Shalom.

Weekly summary of ongoing humanitarian efforts (26.5-1.6):

????1,858 trucks entered via the Kerem Shalom and Erez West crossing points.

Including:
????764 Egyptian trucks
????312 trucks of flour per @PAM.
????124 Jordanian trucks
⛽️13 tankers carrying more than half a million liters of fuel.

We… pic.twitter.com/94hxAiJro7

– COGAT (@cogatonline) June 2, 2024

There is no mention of aid drops into Gaza, where the United Nations has warned of “impending famine” among many of the densely populated coastal enclave’s 2.3 million residents.

Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry says more than 35,000 people have been killed or presumed dead in the fighting so far, although only 24,000 deaths have been identified in hospitals. The toll, which cannot be verified, includes some 15,000 terrorists whom Israel claims to have killed in combat. Israel also claims to have killed some 1,000 terrorists in Israel on October 7.

A total of 294 soldiers were killed during the ground offensive against Hamas and during operations along the border with Gaza. A civilian Defense Ministry contractor was also killed in the Gaza Strip.

Agencies contributed to this report.