JERUSALEM — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Thursday that he has directed Israel’s military to take over 70% of Gaza’s territory. Netanyahu’s statement comes as Israel continues strikes on Gaza despite the ceasefire, as Israel and Hamas remain deadlocked in indirect, US-brokered talks to advance President Donald Trump’s peace plan for Gaza. Speaking at a conference in the occupied West Bank, Netanyahu said, “We are currently squeezing Hamas; we now control 60 percent of the territory of the Strip – you know this. We were at 50, we moved to 60. My directive is to move to,” he said before pausing as someone in the crowd said, “100”. “Let’s go step by step. First of all, 70. Let’s start with that. We’re pressing them from all sides, we’ll deal with the remnants,” he said. The expansion by Israel contradicts the terms of the Trump-led ceasefire agreement, which Israel and Hamas agreed to in October 2025. Netanyahu has made several public remarks confirming that the IDF controls more than 60% of the Strip, up from the 53% agreed at the time of the US-brokered ceasefire deal in October 2025. Under that agreement, the IDF withdrew to a demarcation line, known as the “yellow line”, which left Israel in control of roughly 53% of Gaza. The seizure of more of Gaza would force approximately 2 million Palestinians into a shrinking fraction of the coastal enclave’s shattered territory. On Tuesday, Hamas accused Israel of moving the line, saying this “constitutes an explicit and ongoing undermining of the ceasefire agreement, a serious violation of its provisions, and an exposed attempt to impose new facts on the ground by force, with the aim of entrenching military control over the Strip and undermining any real chance of stabilizing the situation or making de-escalation efforts succeed.” Both Israel and Hamas are supposed to be abiding by the terms of the US-brokered ceasefire agreement, which went into effect in October. But progress on the plan, which was promoted by President Donald Trump, has stalled, risking a scenario in which Gaza’s territory becomes permanently divided. Nickolay Mladenov, a Bulgarian diplomat who serves as the official in charge of implementing the agreement, warned earlier this month that without progress, the yellow line could turn “into a fence or wall, a permanent separation of Gaza.” Mladenov acknowledged a reality on the ground in Gaza in which “civilians are still being killed” and “families live in fear” of Israeli airstrikes. The next steps in the 20-point peace proposal would see Hamas disarm and Israeli troops withdraw, but indirect talks between Israel and the Palestinian armed group have stalled. On Wednesday, Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz wrote on X that his country had “pledged to eliminate everyone who led the October 7 massacre” in 2023. “We pledged that Hamas will not rule Gaza civilly or militarily,” he said. He also said that what he called the “plan for voluntary emigration from Gaza” would be implemented “at the proper time and in the proper manner”. Israel’s far-right National Security minister Itamar Ben Gvir and far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich have previously publicly defended what they describe as the “voluntary migration” of Palestinians from Gaza – which could amount to the forced displacement of civilians, a war crime – and resettling it with Jews. This week has also seen several strikes in Gaza. At least 10 people, including five children, were killed in an Israeli strike on a building in Gaza City late on Wednesday, according to local hospitals. The Israeli military has released a short statement saying it struck “two central Hamas terrorists in the northern Gaza Strip”, without disclosing their identities. The target of the attack appeared to have been Hamas battalion commander Imad Asleem, who was killed alongside his teenage daughter Israa. The Gaza City attack came a day after the newly chosen head of the Hamas military wing, Mohammed Odeh, was killed along with his wife and two sons in an Israeli strike. One other woman was reportedly killed. The Israeli military has also said a strike on a car in Khan Younis on Tuesday killed Ihab Khrizim, the head of a Hamas funds transfer network, and Mohammed al-Habash, a unit commander in Hamas’s production headquarters who was said to have been involved in weapons manufacturing.
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