Just picked up on Netanyahus speech on the land grab and move to take 70% of Gaza
Clearly Israel's ‘we have a right to defend ourselves’ is out in the open now as an excuse to steal and occupy land that is not theirs.
I do wonder if anyone around the negotiating table for Iran and Lebanons ceasefire can believe anything the US say as
They have not protected the ceasefire in Gaza from Israel’s onslaught.
From the Irish Examiner
‘ The Trump plan also said: “No one will be forced to leave Gaza, and those who wish to leave will be free to do so and free to return. We will encourage people to stay and offer them the opportunity to build a better Gaza.”
Muhammad Shehada, a visiting fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations, said: “Netanyahu is now declaring the whole Trump deal, the framework for Gaza, to be null and void. That’s what it means in a nutshell. There’s no other way to spell it out.”
The UN briefing refers to an Israeli-backed anti-Hamas militia run by a Gaza warlord, Ashraf al-Mansi, saying it had advanced westwards from the yellow line around Jabalia last week.
Such militias have been increasingly active along the yellow line, apparently functioning as shock troops for the Israeli army, carrying out attacks on Hamas but also telling Palestinian residents near the yellow line to leave their homes.
Wael Nayef Abu al-Ajeen, a 26-year-old who lives to the east of Deir al-Balah in southern Gaza, said his family had been forced out by militiamen earlier this month.
“It was at around 1pm when armed men affiliated with the militias entered our area. They went to the homes of the Abu al-Ajeen family there and informed them that they had until 10pm to evacuate all the houses in the area,” Mr Ajeen said. “They instructed them to take whatever furniture and belongings they could carry and to empty the houses as much as possible. They also told them not to return until they were contacted and informed that it was permitted.
“As a result, everyone panicked, and people gradually began leaving and moving their furniture and whatever belongings they could carry until the area was almost completely emptied.”
Nasser Khdour, a researcher at the monitoring group the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project said: “We have seen that the militias are not only attacking Hamas, but also they are contributing to pushing the residents who are living close to their line, further to the west.
“We have seen killing, arresting and kidnapping of civilians living in these areas, and recently, there’s an increase also in the militias’ patrolling activities.”
A UN security council resolution passed in November delegated the monitoring of the ceasefire to a Trump-appointed Board of Peace, which named a Bulgarian UN veteran diplomat, Nickolay Mladenov, as “high representative in Gaza”.
Mr Mladenov was widely criticised for his report to the security council last week, which assigned primary blame for the failings of the ceasefire on Hamas, accusing it of refusing to disarm, without holding Israel accountable for its violations. Hamas has signalled it is ready to discuss disarmament once Israel has fulfilled its obligations under the first phase of the ceasefire, in particular by ceasing the bombardment of Gaza and withdrawing to the original yellow line.’