Israel Says ‘Gates of Hell’ Will Open in Gaza If Hamas Doesn’t Release Hostages

Israel’s defense minister, Yisrael Katz, warned Hamas again on Monday that the “gates of hell will open in Gaza” if the terror group doesn’t release the hostages. Mr. Katz’s comment came after President Trump said that Israel has a “decision” to make regarding the war against Hamas in Gaza as cease-fire negotiations hit yet another wall. “They don’t want to give [the hostages] back, and so Israel is going to have to make a decision,” Mr. Trump said on Sunday as he met with the European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen. “I know what I’d do, but I don’t think it’s appropriate that I say it. But Israel is going to have to make a decision,” Mr. Trump said. Senator Graham meanwhile suggested in an interview with NBC that Israel would do in Gaza “what we did in Tokyo and Berlin.” “I think President Trump has come to believe, and I’ve certainly come to believe, there’s no way you’re going to negotiate an end to this war with Hamas,” Mr. Graham said.“All I can say is that you’re going to see, I think, in the next days and weeks, a military effort to destroy Hamas, akin to what we did in Tokyo and Berlin to destroy the Nazis and the Japanese,” he added. Both the United States and Israel pulled their negotiations teams from Qatar last week, accusing Hamas of sabotaging the talks. Hamas surprised mediators by demanding that Israel release 30 Palestinians serving life sentences for each living hostage, according to an Israeli newspaper, Haaretz. Prime Minister Netanyahu said that Israel will have to look for “alternative options” to get the remaining 50 hostages out of Gaza, while stressing on Sunday that the war will continue until Hamas is eliminated. Israel’s education minister, Yoav Kisch, suggested on Monday that the hostages will not be freed through a deal with Hamas. “The possibility of bringing back the hostages through a framework [for a deal] is zero. What we need to focus on is how to achieve the war goals knowing that Hamas will not release hostages,” Mr. Kisch told Israel’s Kan public broadcaster.The national security minister and security cabinet member, Itamar Ben-Gvir, also struck a defiant tone, saying that Israel has an opportunity to “occupy all of the Gaza Strip, to encourage voluntary migration and to take down as many Hamasniks as possible.”It’s unclear if Israel will send a delegation to Qatar this week to continue cease-fire negotiations with Hamas. Hamas’s point man in the cease-fire talks, Khalil al-Hayya, contradicted the United States and Israel on Sunday, saying there had been “clear progress” last week in Doha. “We agreed to a large portion of what the mediators proposed, and they conveyed to us positive responses from the Zionist occupation. We were surprised that the occupation withdrew from the negotiations,” he said.

Israel Says ‘Gates of Hell’ Will Open in Gaza If Hamas Doesn’t Release Hostages

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