Netanyahu: ‘Israel Determined To Enter Rafah’
By Stefan J. Bos, Chief International Correspondent Worthy News
JERUSALEM (Worthy News) – Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Thursday that Israel “is determined” to go into the southern Gaza city of Rafah to destroy the last battalions of Hamas in a war that he admitted had killed 16,000 civilians and 14,000 combatants in Gaza.
Despite his plan to go into Rafah, Netanyahu hopes that he and U.S. President Joe Biden can overcome their disagreements over the war in Gaza after Biden withheld weapons from Israel.
“We often had our agreements, but we’ve had our disagreements. We’ve been able to overcome them. I hope we can overcome them now, but we will do what we have to do to protect our country,” Netanyahu said in an interview on the “Dr. Phil Primetime” television show.
He pledged to fight Hamas with his fingernails if necessary as he dismissed President Biden’s warning that he would not provide arms for a major military operation in Rafah.
“If we need to stand alone, we will stand alone,” Netanyahu said. “I have said that if necessary – we will fight with our fingernails.”
“But we have much more than fingernails, and with that same strength of spirit, with God’s help, together we will win,” he said.
He spoke after Biden told U.S. broadcaster CNN Wednesday, “I’ve made it clear that if they [Israel] go into Rafah… I’m not supplying the weapons that have historically been used to deal with Rafah,” the president stressed.
BURNED TO DEATH
In an emotionally charged interview, Netanyahu recalled the October 7 massacre, including a family burned to death. “The parents tried to hide the babies just as Anne Frank hid in the war. After killing their parents, these monsters found the babies and killed them too,” Netanyahu said.
He said Israel has no other option than to fight back against a group that has in its charter “to kill every Jew” and to destroy the state of Israel. “If you hear the slogan: ‘from the River to the Sea, Palestine will be Free,’ that is Israel,” Netanyahu said from a terrace overlooking Jerusalem.
Some, “75 years we were defenseless, and Jews went up in flames of Auschwitz. We have unbelievably brave soldiers, men and women,” he added.
He wondered: “Where are all the women’s organizations? Women were raped [by Hamas] after being beheaded.”
In a first public acknowledgment, the prime minister said, “We killed about 14,000 Hamas fighters and some 16,000 civilians” in Gaza. “The civilian toll is slightly higher because they [Hamas] are hiding among civilians. For us, every civilian death is a tragedy. For them, it is a strategy,” he said.
Asked whether it is difficult to differentiate between Hamas and civilians, he said that the ideology is also spread among ordinary Palestinians. He recalled that Israeli soldiers found pictures of Adolf Hitler and his Mein Kampf book, which became the base for the Holocaust, also known as the Shoah.
Netanyahu stressed that Israel sent millions of pamphlets and made phone calls to warn civilians about the attacks. “That is why the civilian death toll is much lower than similar fighting when U.S. soldiers had to go after the Japanese troops in Manilla when 100,000 people were killed.”
MOST BATTALIONS DESTROYED
He said that Israel has “destroyed 20 of 24 battalions of Hamas. We have four more to go in Rafah. That is why we have to go into Rafah. I am committed to getting back their hostages. And to prevent another October 7.”
He pushed back at criticism that Israel’s fighting amounted to war crimes. “Imagine if the allies had not entered Berlin, history would have been different now.”
The prime minister admitted that he and the government made major mistakes ahead of the October 7 attacks. “That discussion will come later. We have to win and ensure this mistake does not happen again.”
He also said humanitarian aid is entering Gaza but that Hamas was taking part in the deliveries.
The prime minister condemned those involved in pro-Palestine protests at universities across the United States. “Their history knowledge goes as far as their last breakfast.”
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