Israeli defence minister threatens to open ‘gates of hell’ if Hamas does not disarm
Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz says “soon, the gates of hell will open” if Hamas does not agree to “Israel’s conditions for ending the war, primarily the release of all hostages and their disarmament”.
“If they do not agree, Gaza [City], the capital of Hamas, will become Rafah and Beit Hanoon,” he added, referring to two cities in Gaza largely razed during previous Israeli operations.
Mediators have been waiting for days for an official Israeli response to their latest ceasefire proposal, which Hamas accepted earlier this week.
Israel’s offensive has killed more than 62,000 Palestinians, most of them civilians, according to figures from the Health Ministry in Gaza.
Leaked Israeli intelligence on Gaza civilian deaths paints unsurprising picture
Classified Israeli military intelligence figures showing that 83 percent of those killed in Gaza were civilians are appalling, but no great surprise, says an analyst.
Speaking to Al Jazeera, Lorenzo Kamel, a history professor at the University of Turin, said the leaked documents painted a picture of indiscriminate slaughter that tallied with the reports out of Gaza, as well as research on the war.
Those studies included a 2025 study by The Lancet medical publication that found life expectancy in Gaza had dropped from a pre-war level of 75.5 years to about 40.5 years in the first year of the war.
“We didn’t need … this [leaked Israeli data] to confirm what is happening,” he said. “It was pretty obvious that the situation was this.”
Rights groups and genocide scholars argue the leaked data – revealing an extremely high rate of civilian deaths – supports claims that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza.
