Finance minister says Netanyahu should back annexation and settlement, and attacks Turkey and Qatar’s role on Gaza ‘executive board’
Far-right members of Israel’s governing coalition on Sunday rejected a US-backed plan for postwar governance in Gaza, criticising their prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, for failing to annex the Palestinian territory and establish new Israeli settlements in the territory.
After the announcement of the White House’s pick of world leaders who will join the so-called Gaza “board of peace”, which includes representatives of Turkey and Qatar, both of which have been critical of Israel’s war in the strip, Israeli far-right finance minister, Bezalel Smotrich, described Netanyahu’s “unwillingness to take responsibility for Gaza” as “the original sin”.
According to Smotrich, himself a settler in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, the Israeli prime minister should instead “establish a military government there, to encourage immigration and settlement, and in this way to ensure Israel’s security for many years”.
The White House announced this week the setting up of the “Gaza executive board”, which will operate under a broader “board of peace” to be chaired by Donald Trump as part of his 20-point plan to end the war.
