Far-right Israeli minister Ben-Gvir threatens to dissolve cabinet if Gaza bombing stops

Israel's so-called national security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, has threatened to dissolve the regime’s incumbent administration if the devastating bombing campaign against Palestinians in the besieged Gaza Strip stops.

“Stopping the war = dissolution of the cabinet,” the 47-year-old far-right politician wrote in a post on X, formerly known as Twitter.

Israeli finance minister, Bezalel Smotrich, also said on X that a ceasefire in exchange for returning all captives held in Gaza is “a plan to eliminate Israel.”

The controversial comments coincided with talks on a possible new agreement for a long-term humanitarian truce in the Gaza Strip.

On Wednesday, a source close to the Palestinian Hamas resistance movement said the group is willing to extend the truce by an additional four days.

“Hamas has informed the mediators that it is willing to extend the truce for four days and that the movement would be able to release Israeli prisoners that it, other resistance movements, and other parties [have held] during this period, according to the terms of the existing truce,” the source told AFP.

ICRC appeals for urgent assistance to meet humanitarian needs in war-ravaged Gaza

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) appeals for urgent assistance to meet humanitarian needs in the war-ravaged Gaza Strip.

According to Gaza City mayor Yahya al-Sarraj, the extent of the damage caused by Israeli attacks is only just being discovered due to the truce.

“When we move around Gaza, we feel very angry and sad. We are discovering now how much damage has been inflicted on the infrastructure of the city – on cultural centers, libraries and main public squares,” he said.

“The headquarters of the main municipality has been hit hard with two attacks, damaging three stories of one building and destroying thousands of documents of important historical value. The damage is unbelievable around the city.

“About 60 percent of housing units and apartments [have been destroyed]. Thousands of people are now homeless. They either live in schools or shelters or at their relatives’ houses. These apartments are not livable at the moment. [Israeli forces] destroyed many water wells,” Sarraj noted.

Israel launched the war on Gaza on October 7 after the Palestinian resistance movement Hamas waged the surprise Operation Al-Aqsa Storm against the occupying entity in response to the Israeli regime's decades-long campaign of bloodletting and devastation against Palestinians.

A four-day truce took effect on Friday to allow the delivery of humanitarian aid to Gaza after seven weeks of unrelenting bombardment. The regime and Hamas agreed to extend it for two more days on Monday.

According to the Gaza-based health ministry, so far over 15,000 Palestinians have been killed in Israeli strikes, most of them women and children.

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