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Israeli far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich called on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to approve the establishment of three illegal settlements along the northern border of the Gaza Strip.
Smotrich said on X that Israelis were returning to settlements previously evacuated in the occupied West Bank and that plans were underway to establish three settlementsnear Gaza’s northern border.
He urged Netanyahu to approve the proposal and said Israel would not only return to settlements evacuated in 2005 but would also establish additional settlements in the West Bank.
Israel’s 2005 disengagement plan, implemented under then-Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, removed Israeli settlements and military camps from Gaza and evacuated four settlements in the northern West Bank.
The Israeli parliament passed legislation in March 2024 repealing the disengagement law.
The Palestinian Authority has repeatedly urged the international community to pressure Israel to end settlement activity in occupied Palestinian territories, which the United Nations considers illegal.
About 750,000 Israeli settlers live in 141 illegalsettlements and 224 unauthorized outposts in the West Bank. About 250,000 Israelis also live in East Jerusalem.
Smotrich’s statement came as Israeli strikes around midnight hit several residential buildings in Gaza and killed at least eight people, civil defense officials said Sunday.
A man and his wife were killed, and several others wounded when an Israeli military helicopter struck an apartment near the central Gaza Strip, a civil defense spokesperson said.
An elderly man and a child were killed in another attack on an apartment west of Gaza City.
Three people, including a child, were killed when a strike hit an apartment northwest of Khan Younis in southern Gaza.
Authorities said eight other people were killed Saturday in strikes that damaged medical supplies at a hospital and targeted a rooftop.
The strikes came after Hamas said Friday that it had accepted the latest stage of a plan backed by U.S. President Donald Trump to end the war.
The proposal includes provisions for Hamas to surrender its weapons and for Israeli forces to withdraw gradually from the Gaza Strip.
Israel has not officially responded to the agreement.
An Israeli political source told Agence France-Presse (AFP) that there would be no withdrawal without Hamas’ “genuine disarmament.”
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