Far-right minister says Israel should bomb humanitarian aid, ‘starve’ Gazans
Heritage Minister Amichay Eliyahu – who previously urged considering nuclear strike on Strip – says the civilian population in Gaza is complicit and should suffer to pressure Hamas
Far-right Heritage Minister Amichay Eliyahu said Monday that Israel should bomb food and fuel reserves in Gaza to starve the population as part of a strategy of exerting direct pressure on Hamas by targeting the civilian population.
“We must stop humanitarian aid,” the Otzma Yehudit minister told Israel National News. “As long as we give food to those who fight us — we are endangering our hostages and our soldiers.”
He accused Gaza’s civilian population of supporting Hamas’s October 7 massacre and said it should be made to suffer the consequences.
“[The civilians] gave Hamas the wind in its sails,” Eliyahu said. “If the people of Gaza suffer, Hamas will suffer. There is no problem bombing their food and fuel reserves. They should starve.”
Eliyahu, an observant Jew and grandson of former Sephardi chief rabbi of Israel Mordechai Eliyahu, dismissed arguments that withholding food contradicts Jewish values.
“This strange talk about humanitarian aid has nothing to do with Jewish values,” he said.
The minister also called on the government to push a voluntary emigration program for Gazans who fear for their lives, accusing officials of “lazy implementation.”
More than 60 days have passed since Israel imposed a full ban on the entry of humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip, including food, water, medical supplies, fuel, and material for shelters.
The period marks the longest time in which no aid has entered the Palestinian territory since war broke out with Hamas’s October 7, 2023, attack on Israel.
Eliyahu is no stranger to making controversial remarks. In November 2023, he sparked international outrage by claiming that dropping a nuclear bomb on the Gaza Strip was “an option” — a statement called “detached from reality” by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
This statement was later cited by South Africa in a motion accusing Israel of genocide before the International Court of Justice, prompting Eliyahu to brag that “even in The Hague they know my position.”
The incendiary comment from Eliyahu, along with similar ones from other Israeli leaders, was used to try and show that Israel had genocidal intent in Gaza. Israel vociferously denies the allegations and says Hamas is responsible for many civilian deaths because it uses the Gaza population as human shields.
In his latest interview, the minister also criticized the military for the ongoing war. “The burden is on the military leadership to lead us to victory,” he said, and dismissed those who say it’s impossible to achieve both of the two stated war goals of defeating Hamas and returning the hostages.
According to Eliyahu, if Israel prevailed in the 1948 War of Independence “when we had no weapons,” and in the 1967 Six Day war “when we were on the brink,” then defeating Hamas — whom he called “weak” — should be easy.
“We have [American] backing and we need to take advantage of it,” he said. “Any situation that allows Hamas or other extremist groups to survive will cost us.”
Israeli officials have said that enough aid entered the Strip during the two-month ceasefire that ended in March to allow Gazans to survive the current halt as Israel seeks to ramp up pressure on Hamas for the return of 59 hostages remaining captive in the enclave, a stance that Eliyahu supports.
“The two [hostage] deals we made were out of fear and pressure [felt by Hamas],” he said. “That has to happen again.”
It is believed that 58 of the 251 hostages abducted by Hamas during the October 7, 2023 onslaught remain in Gaza, including the bodies of at least 34 confirmed dead by the IDF, plus the body of an IDF soldier killed in 2014.
The Hostages and Missing Families Forum have repeatedly warned that the government’s two war goals are incompatible, accusing it on Monday of “choosing territory over hostages.”
Polls have consistently shown that a large majority of the Israeli public favors a deal that would see all the hostages held in Gaza released, even if it means ending the war.
The Times of Israel Community.