JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Israel is examining a plan to use siege tactics against Hamas in northern Gaza, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was quoted by several Israeli media outlets as saying on Sunday.
Netanyahu’s office did not respond to a request for comment. The reports cited unnamed sources at a closed parliament committee meeting.
The plan, published by retired military commanders and floated by some parliament members this month, suggests Palestinian civilians would be instructed to evacuate northern Gaza, which would then be declared a closed military zone.
An estimated 5,000 Hamas militants remaining there would then be put under siege until they surrender. Army Radio reported that Netanyahu told lawmakers at parliament’s Foreign Affairs and Defence Committee that it was being examined.
Public broadcaster Kan quoted Netanyahu as saying that the blueprint “makes sense” and that “it is one of the plans being considered but there are others as well.”
Israel has faced fierce international criticism for the humanitarian crisis brought on by its nearly one-year offensive against the Hamas militant group in Gaza.
Most of Gaza’s population has been displaced. An estimated one million people – half the population – are currently crammed into a designated humanitarian zone that makes up less than 15% of the territory and is lacking essential infrastructure and services, according to the United Nations.
Humanitarian access to northern Gaza, where estimates of the population run between 300,000 and 500,000 people – is especially difficult, according to the United Nations.
The war was sparked when Hamas-led militants burst into Israel on Oct. 7, killing 1,200 people, most of them civilians, and taking another 250 hostage into Gaza, according to Israeli tallies.
More than 41,000 Palestinians have been killed in the Israeli offensive since, according to the Gaza health ministry. Gaza health officials say most are civilians.
Israel, which has lost 346 soldiers in Gaza, says at least a third of the Palestinian fatalities are fighters.
(Reporting by Maayan Lubell; Additional reporting by Nidal al-Mughrabi; Editing by Conor Humphries)
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