In a stance reflecting the racist nature and eliminationist policies of the far-right occupation government, Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich called on Tuesday for a large-scale military escalation in the Gaza Strip following the end of the ongoing war with Iran. Meanwhile, Communications Minister Shlomo Karhi urged for the intensification of the forced displacement of Palestinians from the territory.
These statements coincided with an announcement by former US President Donald Trump regarding a ceasefire agreement between Israel and Iran, following weeks of mutual escalation that involved ballistic missiles and precision attacks on sensitive sites on both sides, resulting in the killing and injury of a number of military personnel and civilians.
Despite the declared ceasefire on the Iranian front, both ministers asserted that “the real battle” is not over, but is now shifting with full force to the Gaza Strip—an indication of intentions to continue the assault that began on 7 October 2023, which has led to the killing and injuring of over 187,000 Palestinians, the majority of whom are women and children, with more than 11,000 people still missing under the rubble, and the displacement of hundreds of thousands amid near-total destruction of civilian infrastructure.
The ministers’ remarks expose premeditated intentions to carry out further grave violations against Palestinian civilians, particularly as the forced displacement advocated by Minister Karhi constitutes a crime under international law and a flagrant breach of the Geneva Conventions, which prohibit the forcible transfer of populations under occupation. Calls for demographic engineering through force also amount to a form of ethnic cleansing.
Smotrich stated, “The next phase is Gaza,” stressing the need for the “complete elimination of Hamas and the retrieval of the hostages”—language which frames Palestinians as legitimate targets and reduces an entire civilian-populated territory to a battlefield to be flattened.
Karhi went even further, praising what he termed the “historic cooperation” with the US administration to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear capabilities, before immediately calling for the “enhancement of the migration programme”—a term used by some Israeli officials to refer to a plan for the forced displacement of the indigenous population of Gaza to Sinai or other regions, in blatant violation of international humanitarian law and Palestinians’ inalienable right to remain on their land.
These statements come at a time when Gaza’s population is enduring a suffocating siege and facing an unprecedented humanitarian catastrophe, marked by the collapse of the healthcare system, acute food and water insecurity, and the destruction of over 70% of the housing infrastructure, all amidst the absence of any effective international protection or accountability for those responsible for these violations.
These positions, coming from ministers within the occupation government, do not reflect isolated personal opinions as much as they represent the policies of a state built on racial supremacy and the imposition of power-based realities—persistently turning the conflict into an eliminationist project targeting Palestinian existence—while the official international community continues to turn a blind eye to a historic massacre unfolding in plain sight.
