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Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said “it may be just and moral” to starve 2 million Gaza residents until Israeli hostages are returned, but “no one in the world would let us.”
In a speech on Monday at the Katif Conference for National Responsibility in the town of Yad Binyamin, the far-right minister said Israel should take control of distributing aid inside Gaza and claimed that Hamas was in control of distribution channels within the strip.
“It is impossible in today’s global reality to wage war – no one in the world would let us starve and thirst two million citizens, even though it may be just and moral until they return our hostages,” he said, adding that if Israel controlled aid distribution instead of Hamas, the war would have ended by now and the hostages would have returned.
“You cannot fight Hamas with one hand and give them aid with the other. It’s his (Hamas’) money, it’s his fuel, it’s his civilian control of the Gaza Strip. It just doesn’t work,” he said.
Israel has control over aid that enters Gaza and aid groups are in charge of distributing it. While there have been some anecdotal reports from Gazans of Hamas stealing aid, it’s unclear how rampant it is. US Special Envoy David Satterfield said in February that no Israeli official had presented him or the Biden administration with “specific evidence of diversion or theft of assistance.”
Israel is facing mounting criticism from aid groups and international organizations for restricting food aid to the besieged Gaza Strip. A United Nations statement, citing independent experts, indicated last month that famine has spread across the entire enclave. The experts accused Israel of conducting an “intentional and targeted starvation campaign,” which they termed a “form of genocidal violence.”
The International Criminal Court’s prosecutor is seeking arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Yoav Gallant on charges of “starvation as a weapon of war,” among other allegations.
