The Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan, during his 2024 Saviours’ Day message, titled, “What Allah, The Great Mahdi And The Great Messiah Have To Say About The War in the Middle East?”
said that Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu wanted to “take absolute control of all Gaza, all of the West Bank, all of Eastern Jerusalem and there would be not one Palestinian left.”
We see this coming to fruition with the recent news that Mr. Netanyahu is eying the re-occupation of the Gaza Strip. The proposed move is widely condemned by rights groups, other countries, and is opposed by senior military officials who argue the scheme will escalate a war that has already displaced and slaughtered tens of thousands of Palestinians.
There are reports that Israel will increase its military operations in the besieged Palestinian territory of Gaza, but will not annex it entirely or keep it “long term.” At Final Call presstime, it was widely reported that Israel’s security cabinet had approved the plan to take over Gaza City.
Before announcing total annexation of Gaza was nixed, the embattled prime minister claimed Israel was not seeking to govern Gaza long term and would supposedly hand over control to unnamed “Arab partners” friendly to Israel. However, during an Aug. 6 interview on Fox News, Mr. Netanyahu was definite when asked if Israel would take control of all of Gaza.
“We intend to,” he replied, using the pretext of security and removing Hamas, an oft-repeated aim he uses as an excuse to continue fighting.
According to reporting from Al Jazeera on Aug. 8, “The Israeli military operation reportedly involves ‘all Palestinian civilians’ being displaced from the northern city to camps in central Gaza.”
Hamas immediately condemned Israel’s plans, calling it “a war crime” and accusing Israel of “sacrificing” captives held in the enclave, reported aljazeera.com. Palestinian Islamic Jihad said, :“Israel’s plans to expand its assault on Gaza were ‘a new chapter in the war of extermination,’” the outlet reported.
The office of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas also issued a statement calling for Israel to halt its actions. According to Wafa, the Palestinian news and information agency, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas made his remarks during a phone call with his Egyptian counterpart Abdel Fattah El-Sisi.
“He slammed the Israeli cabinet’s decision to fully occupy Gaza as a new crime added to the series of Israeli crimes in the West Bank, including Jerusalem, and stressing that it must be stopped immediately.
“He affirmed that he will continue political action at all levels, including approaching the UN Security Council, the League of Arab States, and the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, to rally international and regional positions against these plans,” reported Wafa.
Global condemnation was swift. Many officials from several nations, including Saudi Arabia, China, Germany, Norway, Turkey, Denmark, and Russia, criticized Israel’s plans. The EU and UN also criticized the move.
In speaking to reporters at UN headquarters in New York, Dmitry Polyanskiy, Russia’s deputy ambassador to the U.N. said, “We think that this is a very bad step in an absolutely wrong direction, and we condemn this kind of action,” reported Anadolu Ajansi, the official press agency of Turkey.
Volker Turk, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, issued a statement on Aug. 8, stating, “The Israeli Government’s plan for a complete military takeover of the occupied Gaza strip must be immediately halted.”
He continued, “On all evidence to date, this further escalation will result in more massive forced displacement, more killing, more unbearable suffering, senseless destruction and atrocity crimes.”
Demonstrations erupted even in Israel at the announcement. Since the brutal onslaught by Israel that began on October 7, 2023, the Israeli military has controlled 75% of Gaza.
Critics point out that, with nearly two years of war and a bloody history going back multiple decades, Mr. Netanyahu’s words about temporary occupation are deceitful. Observers argue the move, whether temporary or permanent, could further inflame tensions in the region.
Wafic Faour, a Vermont-based organizer and Palestinian refugee, told The Final Call such a proposal is unrealistic. Israel cannot control Gaza’s population of over two million people. The plan aims to push Gaza’s population out by making life “unbearable,” and create a “safety zone” for just Israelis.
Mr. Faour explained that the move is not a shift towards “occupation” but an escalation of the occupation that has existed for decades. To talk about Israelis re-occupying Gaza as a new dynamic since Oct. 7, 2023, when the current war started, is to erase decades of reality. “Gaza was never free,” said Mr. Faour.
Years before October 2023, Gaza suffered under a suffocating blockade, military control of borders, airspace, maritime access, and repeated assaults that rendered it impoverished. Palestinians in Gaza have endured structural violence and domination for nearly two decades under siege—and for far longer under Israeli control.
However, with ethical boundaries crossed, broken and near nonexistent, with ceasefire talks at a standstill and genocidal slaughter of Palestinians continuing unabated, a push for full annexation is not surprising.
Complete annexation and Palestinian expulsion are political mainstays of far-right members of Mr. Netanyahu’s coalition government and among Israel’s extremist settlement movement advocating for expansion.
However, the drive for annexation waxes against United Nations Security Council Resolution 2334 (2016) that determined Israel’s settlement activity has “no legal validity” and constitutes a “flagrant violation” under international law.
Mr. Netanyahu is in the throes of intense global pressure to reach a ceasefire deal, but he also faces pressure from within his coalition government to continue the war, expel Palestinians and take over Gaza.
“A message must be sent: to ensure that we conquer all of the Gaza Strip, declare sovereignty over the entire Gaza Strip. Take down every Hamas member, and encourage voluntary migration,” said Itamar Ben-Gvir, Israel’s minister of National Security, in an X post on Aug. 3. Ben-Gvir is a staunch proponent for Palestinian expulsion and constructing illegal Jewish settlements.
In the course of the present war, questions arose as to why Mr. Netanyahu appears bent on perpetual war. That question was addressed and answered by the Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan, the National Representative of the Most Honorable Elijah Muhammad.
Also, during his February 2024 Saviours’ Day address titled “What Does Allah, The Great Mahdi and The Great Messiah Have To Say About The War In The Middle East?” Minister Farrakhan also explained why Netanyahu will not end the war.
Minister Farrakhan explained that the war in Gaza was a genocidal attack that Mr. Netanyahu knew would preserve his place as a great Jewish leader.
“People do strange things when their hatred is so great of the people that they are killing; that their intention was to cleanse Gaza of every Palestinian that lived there and cleanse the West Bank and East Jerusalem so that Israel would not be bothered with Palestinians anymore,” Minister Farrakhan stated.
Minister Farrakhan also pointed to a broader agenda driving Netanyahu’s war, which is the pursuit of energy and regional dominance. Under the cover of war, Israel sees an opportunity to seize Gaza’s offshore gas reserves and build the long-envisioned Ben Gurion Canal, a project meant to rival Egypt’s Suez and reshape regional trade. At stake is not just Gaza, but the map of the Middle East and ambitions for “Greater Israel.”
For political analyst Richard Becker, of the Act Now to End War and Racism (A.N.S.W.E.R.) Coalition, the ball is in America’s court as Israel’s chief military and economic backer. At this stage, the real decision-maker is not Netanyahu—it’s President Donald Trump and the U.S., illustrative of Israel’s and America’s long-term relationship.
“Israel is really a subordinate … an extension of U.S. power … a projection of U.S. military power in a key strategic region,” said Mr. Becker. “What Netanyahu is going to do now is largely dependent on what kind of green light he has from Washington,” said Mr. Becker.
Indicative of the daily killing counts of Palestinians and the constant forced moving of the population from one area to another, punctuated with mass killings, is what Israel wants to do, said Mr. Becker.
“What the Netanyahu government really aspires to do is what the Zionist movement has aspired to since it became the State of Israel, and that is to clear the entire population,” he explained. “They couldn’t do it all at once in 1948, although they displaced 750,000 people at that time, and 300,000 more in the Six-Day War (1967).”
Pressure on Palestinians to flee is strategic and aligns with a long-standing goal of annexing the West Bank and Gaza, clearing the land for what successive Israeli governments envisioned for Greater Israel. Forced displacement, then, is not only a byproduct of war—it’s a central feature of settler-colonialism.
For Arab and Muslim nations in the region, most are subordinate to America, but their people overwhelmingly support the Palestinians, but are hindered from taking action.
“And then the question becomes, what is the U.S. going to do? How far will they allow Israel to go? Right now, there are Israeli troops in southern Lebanon … troops in Syria,” Mr. Becker noted.
Other analysts point to Mr. Netanyahu needing the war to save a beleaguered political future in the face of corruption charges and growing disapproval ratings. Others point out that it goes deeper.
“People keep focusing on his personal motivations, that he’s worried that once the war ends, the court cases will gather steam, and there’ll be new elections, and he’ll lose power,” said Middle East analyst Mouin Rabbani.
“I think that’s only part of the explanation, and I don’t think that’s the main explanation,” he reasoned, questioning whether Netanyahu could sustain a permanent war solely to serve his own interests.
Mr. Rabbani says Israel is “stuck at a fork in the road” where the trajectory suggests a full reoccupation of Gaza, reestablishing Jewish settlements and ethnically cleansing Palestinians. Their aim is to incorporate Gaza into Israel, similar to what is happening at a slower pace in the West Bank, he said.
The resolve and determination of the Palestinian people remain strong in the face of opposition. Al Jazeera interviewed Palestinians about Israel’s latest displacement and takeover plans. The outlet interviewed Ahmed Hirz, who said he and his family have been displaced at least eight times since Israel’s war began.
“Now we are here, and the Israelis want to displace us again. We will not go anywhere,” he told Al Jazeera. “I swear to God that I have faced death like 100 times, so for me, it’s better to die here. I will never leave here,” he said. We have gone through suffering and starvation and torture and miserable conditions, and our final decision is to die here.”
Final Call Staff contributed to this report. The Final Call encourages our readers to revisit, rewatch and restudy the 2024 Saviours’ Day message by the Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan, “What Does Allah, The Great Mahdi and The Great Messiah Have To Say About The War In The Middle East?” It can be viewed at media.noi.org.