Israeli Minister of Defense Israel Katz, speaking at an event on Wednesday honoring volunteers of the ZAKA search and rescue organization, said: “If Hamas does not release the hostages soon, Gaza’s gates will be locked, and the gates of hell will open—just as President Trump said.”
He told the emergency response group, which fields more than 3,000 volunteers around the country, that “no other country in the world stands by the sanctity of bringing back the captives—those who are alive and those who are not.”
“We won’t give in. We will do it,” he said.
Katz said that Israel would not permit Hamas to rule in Gaza and that it wouldn’t allow “murderers of that type to sit on our borders and near our communities.”
On March 2, Israel announced that it was stopping further aid from entering the Gaza Strip, a move backed by the United States.
“We will support their decision on next steps, given Hamas has indicated it’s no longer interested in a negotiated ceasefire,” U.S. National Security Council spokesman Brian Hughes said on Sunday.
On Thursday, however, the foreign ministers of the E3—France, Germany and the United Kingdom—called for the renewal of aid deliveries.
“We call on the Government of Israel to abide by its international obligations to ensure the full, rapid, safe and unhindered provision of humanitarian assistance to the population in Gaza,” they said in a joint statement.
Israel’s decision to freeze aid shipments to the Gaza Strip was motivated by Hamas’s theft of the goods and rejection of a truce extension, Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar told the press on Tuesday.
He also noted that aid was a lifeline to Hamas, which confiscated it.
“They are shooting the civilians who try to get access to the aid. They use it as an engine in their war against Israel,” Sa’ar said. “This cannot continue and will not continue.”
