By Maria Ortiz
07 Nov 2023, 17:49 PM EST
The spokesman for the White House National Security Council, John Kirby, mentioned again on Tuesday that the United States government opposes Israel keep the Gaza Strip occupied by ending the conflict with Hamas.
“President Biden has been very clear: We do not support a reoccupation of Gaza by the Israeli defense forces,” Kirby said in a press conference.
Kirby thus reacted to the comment of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who on Monday stated in an interview with the American network ABC that Israel will be in charge of the security of Gaza indefinitely once the war ends.
“I think Israel will have, for an indefinite period, overall responsibility for security because we have seen what happens when we don’t have it,” Netanyahu said.
Kirby did not want to refer directly to the terms used by Netanyahu, but insisted that the United States does not support the occupation of that Palestinian territory.
The Biden administration spokesperson defended that it is “necessary for there to be healthy conversations about what Gaza should look like after the conflict and what its government should look like.”
“What we absolutely agree with our Israeli counterparts on is that it cannot look like it did on October 6” (the day before the Hamas attack on Israel), Kirby said.
In the interview with ABC, Netanyahu defended that Israel assume “responsibility in matters of security” since otherwise, he assured, “what there is is “an eruption of Hamas terror on an unimaginable scale.”
The Israeli offensive in the Gaza Strip in response to the month-long Hamas attack has now left more than 10,320 dead, including 4,237 children.
With information from EFE
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