US Secretary of State, Antony Blinken, has warned that Israel cannot reoccupy Gaza after the war with Hamas ends.
Mr Blinken also insisted Hamas could not continue to rule there as it risked a repetition of the October 7 attacks.
He said there should be no forced displacement, blockade or reduction of territory, and that the West Bank-based Palestinian Authority should govern.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said Israel will have “overall security responsibility” for Gaza indefinitely.
He did not elaborate on what that would entail when he made the comment in a TV interview on Monday, but a senior Israeli official told reporters in Washington on Tuesday that Israel had no intention of reoccupying Gaza or controlling it for “a long time”.
Israel has been bombarding the territory for a month and began a major ground offensive over a week ago with the objective of destroying Hamas, which it, the US and other Western powers consider a terrorist organisation.
The war began after an unprecedented cross-border assault on southern Israel by Hamas on October 7, in which 1,400 people were killed and 240 others taken hostage.
Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry says more than 10,500 people have been killed in the territory since then, while the UN is warning that an “unfolding catastrophe” is making a humanitarian ceasefire more urgent. —BBC
