By SCM Foreign Desk
JERUSALEM — In one of his most definitive and defiant policy statements since the outbreak of the war, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared that Israel has successfully eliminated almost all individuals responsible for the October 7 massacres, while signaling a permanent military footprint in the Gaza Strip and a escalating focus toward Israel’s northern border with Lebanon.
“We killed all those responsible for the October 7 massacre, and perhaps only one remains whom we have not killed,” Mr. Netanyahu said, in an apparent reference to Yahya Sinwar, the Hamas leader believed to be the mastermind behind the cross-border raids that ignited the regional conflagration.
In a sweeping assessment of the military campaign, Mr. Netanyahu also asserted that Israeli forces had successfully pierced the deepest bastions of Hamas stronghold.
“We entered Gaza City and brought back all the hostages,” he stated, framing the highly controversial and costly urban warfare campaign as a strategic success that fulfilled Israel’s primary wartime objectives.
However, it was his remarks regarding the future of Gaza’s geography and governance that are likely to draw the sharpest international scrutiny. Defying months of intense diplomatic pressure from the United States, European allies, and Arab mediating nations, Mr. Netanyahu made it clear that Israel has no intention of fully relinquishing the territory it has occupied over the months of fighting.
“We will remain in the security zones we have established and will not withdraw from them,” Mr. Netanyahu stated firmly.
The declaration marks a formal solidification of Israel’s “day after” strategy, implying the long-term maintenance of military corridors—such as the Netzarim and Philadelphi routes—and buffer zones carved out along Gaza’s periphery.
Critics and international legal experts have previously warned that establishing permanent security zones amounts to a de facto long-term re-occupation of the enclave, a move the Biden administration has repeatedly opposed.
The Prime Minister’s remarks come after months of relentless warfare that has fundamentally reshaped the geopolitical landscape of the Middle East. The conflict began on October 7, when Hamas launched an unprecedented surprise assault on southern Israel, killing approximately 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and abducting over 240 hostages.
In response, Israel launched a multi-phased military campaign aimed at dismantling Hamas’s military and governing capabilities. The ensuing bombardment and ground invasion have laid waste to vast swathes of the Gaza Strip, displacing nearly the entire population of 2.2 million Palestinians and causing a severe humanitarian crisis.
Gaza City, once the vibrant economic heart of the territory, has been reduced to a landscape of shattered concrete and twisted rebar, under which thousands of casualties are still believed to be buried.
While Israel has successfully targeted and killed top Hamas commanders—including military chief Mohammed Deif and political leader Ismail Haniyeh in high-profile operations—the political cost has been immense. Mr. Netanyahu has faced domestic protests from families of hostages demanding a ceasefire deal, alongside international legal challenges at the International Court of Justice.
Even as the military digs in for a long-term presence in Gaza, Mr. Netanyahu used his address to pivot toward Israel’s other brewing crisis: the volatile northern border with Lebanon. Since October 8, Israel and the Iranian-backed militant group Hezbollah have engaged in daily, cross-border rocket fire and airstrikes, forcing the evacuation of tens of thousands of citizens on both sides.
Warning that the tactics utilized against Hamas could easily be redeployed against the Lebanese militia, Mr. Netanyahu issued a stark warning to Beirut and Tehran.
“What we did in Gaza, we will also do in the north, and we have dealt heavy blows to Hezbollah,” he said.
The rhetoric underscores growing fears among diplomats that the war in Gaza is transitioning into a wider regional conflict. In recent weeks, Israeli airstrikes have struck deep inside Lebanese territory, targeting Hezbollah’s elite Radwan forces and weapons depots, while Hezbollah has escalated its drone and missile salvos into northern Israel.
By tying the conclusion of the primary phase of the Gaza campaign to an aggressive posture in the north, Mr. Netanyahu appears to be preparing the Israeli public—and the international community—for a prolonged period of multi-front warfare, with no clear exit strategy in sight.
