Eurasia Press & News
While the long-term logistics of reoccupying Gaza are unclear, Israel is moving ahead with an official policy to ethnically cleanse the Palestinian territory
This month, Israeli forces launched a new offensive in the Gaza Strip meant to “conquer” the besieged enclave and displace its population to the south of the territory for their “protection”.
Once considered a fringe movement, Israel’s takeover of Gaza and expulsion of its residents is now becoming a mainstream ideology among Israelis.
At the beginning of 2025, 42% of Israeli Jews said they supported Israel controlling Gaza when the war ends, while another 2025 survey found the majority of Israeli Jews (82%) support deporting Palestinians from Gaza.
As part of its renewed offensive, Israel is planning to invade Gaza with thousands of ground troops. As Israel prepares its full-scale operation, officials say forces won’t withdraw even if a ceasefire deal is reached, begging the question: is Israel’s war goal the reoccupation of Gaza?
“Israel had set out these two war goals of destroying Hamas’ military and governing capabilities and getting the hostages back,” Mairav Zonszein, a senior analyst on Israel-Palestine for the International Crisis Group, an NGO focused on preventing war, told The New Arab.
“Now that we’re over a year and a half into it, it’s pretty clear it hasn’t been able to achieve either of those goals.”
While these have been Israel’s stated objectives, Dr Ramzy Baroud, an American-Palestinian journalist, told TNA that the government’s intention has always been much more sinister than initially presented.
“From the outset, Israel’s strategy appeared to involve the collective punishment of Gazans,” Baroud said, citing Israeli officials’ genocidal rhetoric throughout the war.
In the past, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu explicitly and repeatedly stated Israel’s goal isn’t to conquer Gaza, leaving those declarations to Israel’s far right instead.
Now, Israel’s army reportedly holds about 40% of Gaza and says it will occupy 75% of the strip in two months with its renewed assault. Netanyahu echoed this, saying, “all the territory of Gaza will be under Israeli security control”, while also advocating for United States President Donald Trump’s plan to expel Palestinians from the Gaza Strip as a condition for ending the war.
“Netanyahu has remained committed to Israel’s initial, albeit not clearly enunciated, objectives of emptying Gaza of its inhabitants,” Baroud said.
Yet while Netanyahu embraces this plan, Dutch-Palestinian analyst Mouin Rabbani says the premier may not believe this is achievable.
“To the extent that Israel can dictate the end game, I think it’s a situation of no end game,” Rabbani told TNA.
Rabbani outlined several challenges Israel has in reaching its goals, such as what Western nations and the Israeli public will tolerate in terms of the government’s actions and preventing the collapse of Netanyahu’s fragile coalition if a ceasefire is reached. Straddling this line means Israel may end up in a state of endless war.
“There are no agreements. There is no armistice. There is no suspension of hostilities,” Rabbani said. “The idea is to keep the dagger pointed at Gaza without either killing it because you have to end the war and without pulling it out.”
Increasing dissent among Israelis is also a key factor in Israel’s government achieving its war goals, specifically the idea of occupying Gaza. A growing number of reservists are refusing to show up for duty, seeing the war as serving political interests rather than returning the hostages.
With estimates suggesting the military occupation of Gaza would require the long-term deployment of four divisions and cost Israeli taxpayers around $7 billion annually, the Israeli public, including soldiers, may reject this solution, and Israel may be unable to fill its military ranks enough to sustain an occupation.
‘Gaza will be entirely destroyed’
One day after Israel’s security cabinet approved the new offensive, entitled “Operation Gideon’s Chariots,” Israeli finance minister Bezalel Smotrich defined Israel’s final objective with the plan.
“Gaza will be entirely destroyed, civilians will be sent to … the south to a humanitarian zone without Hamas or terrorism, and from there they will start to leave in great numbers to third countries,” Smotrich said during a conference on Jewish settlement in the occupied West Bank.
As both the international community and Israeli pundits question what Israel’s strategy is with the war, Palestinian lawyer and former spokesperson for the Palestinian Liberation Organisation (PLO), Diana Buttu, explained that the end result has always been clear.
“They want to make Gaza smaller in size and thinner in population,” Buttu told TNA. “This isn’t separated from what Israel’s actions were 77 years ago and up until the current day. It’s one large continuum.”
While Netanyahu didn’t publicly state he wanted to decrease Gaza’s population, an Israeli news report six weeks into the war revealed that the leader had tasked strategic planning minister, Ron Dermer, with finding ways to “thin” Gaza’s population to a “minimum”.
“It’s a continuation of the state of Israel, which is fewer Arabs, more land,” Buttu said.
Yet whatever Israeli politicians say, whether in public or private, Zonszein says it’s more telling to look at what Israel is doing to Gaza when understanding its goals.
“What’s actually happening on the ground is that Gaza is a place that is unliveable,” Zonszein said.
“They’ve destroyed the infrastructure and the healthcare system…It seems pretty clear that whether or not they say so, what they have been going for is to make it impossible for anybody to live there in any normal way.”
